ENMAX Energy Corporation

Energy, Canada
Focus: custom analytics for risk and product pricing

Energy providers face the serious risks of price-supply instability, irregular weather-driven demand, a complex market and a landscape featuring reorganizations, shifting alliances and mergers. At ENMAX, Alberta’s leading competitive electricity retailer, executives know firsthand the complexities of their industry. They believe a SAS environment will improve the Canadian company’s overall market assessments and valuations to support energy trading, forecasting and analytical functions within its wholesale and retail organizations.

Davin Kivisto, Director of Portfolio Management and Forecasting, says that in 2008 the company will focus on using SAS Analytics and reporting to develop margin-at-risk estimates and to create innovative pricing solutions for customers.

Using SAS technology, ENMAX will examine the risk-return profile of strategic decisions on its overall business. The SAS environment will reduce the limitations of current spreadsheet, database and custom-built applications. Although ENMAX’s large customers represent significant annual revenues, its current approaches limit the company’s ability to create strategic, customer-specific product pricing. SAS will help ENMAX remove these limitations.

ENMAX will also leverage the ad hoc analytical reporting capabilities within the SAS platform to develop a library of ENMAX-specific models that can be made available to other applications and specific business groups. The Web-accessible platform can support diverse ENMAX business units and provide integrated analytical reporting for use in previously developed in-house applications.

“It won’t be easy, but ENMAX believes the secondary effects resulting from improved decision making will provide ENMAX with competitive advantages affecting cash flows,” says Kivisto. “Customer and shareholder value will surely follow.”