Reliance Energy

The evaluation case of Reliance Energy (RE) demonstrates the acquisition of Bombay Suburban Electric Supply LTd. (BSES) by RE and following adjustment processes inside of the Indian energy market. During that time, the Electricity Act of 2003 promoted the competition within the Indian power sector. The number of private players nearly tripled from 16 to almost 40 competitors until 2007. Therefore, it was of high importance for Reliance Energy to adjust and renew the technical infrastructure of BSES to ensure the competitiveness of the company. The current IT-infrastructure faced many problems that affected the customer satisfaction and the enterprise performance negatively. Because of a lack of visibility between the operational units within the IT-systems and an inadequate coordination between the departments, the business procedures weren’t efficient. For these reasons, Reliance Energy focused on the establishment of an efficient IT-system to improve the enterprise performance. Most of the Top Management members of RE had a background in which technology was used to create value. This fact might have played an important role in renewing the IT-systems. A task force consisting out of IT, the operations team of BSES and REs’ ERP implementation and e-enablement teams initiated several jobs to handle the IT inadequacies within BSES. Furthermore, McKinsey Consulting supported the project with their knowledge in technology-enabled business solutions for several industries. The underlaying IT Roadmap included the Operational Efficiencies, Customer Service and Customer Relationship Management. In addition to that, RE also influenced the projects’ progress by culture, training, end user involvement and Top Management support. In Operational Efficiencies, a SCADA- system was integrated to monitor network components and processes the stored data for efficient load management and fault analysis. The task force also started two key initiatives that included Geographical Information Systems for automatizing field operations, place and network monitoring and Automatic Meter Reading to read a utility meter without physical presence. The Trouble Call Management Systems, Billing and Customer Relationship Management were topics of the Customer Service, besides the Learning and Knowledge Management and the Analytics and Reporting Systems. Using SCADA systems, the response time regarding complaints and service responses was reduced. In addition to this, it improved the workflow, for instance, by initiating work orders and monitoring progress. An ARM system is being used to update the billing module for generating bills based on the subscribed tariff plan. The Customer Relationship Management was improved by an Interactive Voice Response and Field Force Automation.

The first one enabled the enterprise to process a growing number of customer calls. The Field Force Automation was aiming on the reduction of service errors and the improvement of overall productivity and effectiveness of employees using mobile terminals. Besides these technological innovations, the Learning and Knowledge Management and the Analytics and Reporting Systems supported the continuous change within BSES. Another significant point is that RE equipped all employees of BSES with efficient computers and teaching programs to make sure that everybody is enabled to use them correctly.