The power to change

For all its ubiquity in modern life, technology still has the ability to surprise even those deep within the system. Mike Hewitt was a three-decade veteran of the tech sector when he was approached by British energy infrastructure firm Smart DCC about becoming its CTO.

“I must admit I’d not heard of Smart DCC at that time,” he tells The CEO Magazine. “I thought they were in the data center space.”

In fact, Data Communications Company provides the infrastructure behind the blooming smart meter technology, a program worth US$17.6 billion. “It’s the fourth largest program on the government portfolio and very successful,” he says.

Enticed by the opportunity to put his considerable skills to work in a growing and vital sector, Hewitt took on the role in late 2020.

“It was clear from the inception of smart metering in 2010 that we needed to do things differently,” he says. “Back then it was about reading meters a few times a month. Very different to where we are today.”

Renewable revolution

The Smart DCC of today manages a network of over 32 million smart meters across Britain, all in service of renewable energy. To maintain peak efficiency and formidable security for that network, Smart DCC works with the British government, energy retailers, managed service providers, distribution network operators and other stakeholders in pursuit of a net zero future.

“Ultimately, we’re a long-term business case,” Hewitt says. “We have to be able to support the innovative new products of energy retailers, we have a regulator, Ofgem, that drives change around the energy industry, and we’ve got to make our network available to the distribution operators. We’re in the middle of all that, there’s pressure on everybody.

“But smart metering is not going to go away. We’ll be here beyond 2040 and we’ve got a duty across our stakeholders to make the right decisions for the technology for today and tomorrow.”

This renewable revolution began in 2017, when the first second-generation smart metering equipment technical specifications (SMETS2) meter was installed in the United Kingdom, replacing SMETS1 technology that dated back to 2013. The original SMETS meter was tied to one energy supplier; SMETS2 cut those strings. In 2019, the challenge for Smart DCC was to migrate the sizable SMETS1 estate to the new generation.

“Those old smart meters were never designed to be connected to a single infrastructure platform like ours,” Hewitt points out. “Six months into my journey with Smart DCC, we hit the 10 million meter mark in our migration plan. This year, in the last couple of weeks, we hit 80 million devices on our network. There’s a huge volume of meters going in, and we’re not stopping here.”

Electrify to decarbonize

Despite this wide coverage, Smart DCC’s work goes on behind the scenes. The benefits of that work, however, are substantial.

“The role smart metering plays in decarbonization is absolutely critical,” Hewitt explains. “To decarbonize, we have to electrify. We’re not going to use any less energy; in fact we’ll use more as we electrify more transport. EVs are almost double the power of your standard home. If we’re going to decarbonize heat, home heat pumps will have to connect to a smart energy network.”

These realizations have hit the United Kingdom rapidly, but it’s Hewitt and his team that are working hard to make them possible.

“We’ve learned that the biggest certainty is uncertainty,” he says. “It’s great being a technologist at a time like this because technology enables many of the challenges we’ve had as a civilization to be solved. We’re learning lessons; we may not have everything right but we’re sharing knowledge around Europe about this smart journey.”

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With the help of strategic partners and fundamental service providers such as Capgemini, IBM and Accenture, knowledge sharing is helping Smart DCC achieve its goals.

“Access to those strong technology organizations has brought with it strong thought leadership on things they do outside the United Kingdom,” Hewitt says.

“They understand we might not be the biggest organization, but we’re strategically very important to this country. And again, we’re in the middle of these big players trying to get them to collaborate on strategy.”

Partnering for the future

Although he admits it’s a word that’s often overused, Hewitt believes in the power of collaboration when done correctly.

“We challenge them to make the right decisions around the architecture to try to reduce our carbon footprint. It’s difficult, but it’s the right thing to do. And a shared goal that both we and our ecosystem partners can get behind is what truly turns them into partners rather than suppliers.”

In 2025, Smart DCC will begin another huge undertaking: deployment of 4G (LTE) technology into the network, which will provide enduring connectivity for at least the next decade.

“As a CTO, when a contract comes to an end you have an opportunity to do something different,” Hewitt says. “To take all the lessons we’ve learned as an organization and determine how we make sure we’re a future-fit platform for the United Kingdom’s energy system.”

That goes as far as increasing the network’s agility to the point where consumers can change energy suppliers multiple times a day.

“If someone’s got a larger renewable estate and it’s generating, you might want to change to that for the next hour,” he says. “Those are the things we have to think about enabling in the future. Our platform has to be scalable to be vital to customers.”

It’s this feeling of vitality that motivates Hewitt in his role as CTO.

“The network we run will touch 20 million homes in the United Kingdom today, and eventually every home. When my grandchildren ask me what I did about climate change, I’ll be able to say we played a pivotal role in enabling that net zero journey,” he reflects.

“And it’s not just me, we have close to 700 amazing people in Smart DCC that all believe in our mission. How can you not be inspired?”