4Home, Sensus in Home Energy Trials With Southern Co., Cleco, Other Utilities

Sunnyvale, Calif.-based home energy management startup 4Home and major smart meter maker Sensus announced in January that they'd be working together to bring home energy management to the masses (see Green Light post).

In a Thursday interview with the Cleantech Group, the two revealed that they are testing that proposition in pilot projects with utilities including Southern Co. (NYSE: SO) subsidiary Alabama Power and Louisiana's Cleco (NYSE: CNL).

Those are among six contracts the partners hope to deliver product for by September, with deployments in the 500 to 15,000-device range, Sensus's Jon Rappaport told Cleantech Group.

That isn't as many as rival home energy management company Tendril, which has trials with more than two dozen utilities and (see Tendril Lands $30M as Growth, Consolidation Loom in Smart Grid).

But it does place 4Home squarely in competition with others in the growing number of venture-funded startups aiming at bringing energy management hardware and software into people's homes (see The Smart Home, Part I).

While some are focusing on getting consumers to buy their products directly, others are focusing on getting utilities to make the push into customers' homes by linking their systems to smart meters being installed by the millions around the country – a path that 4Home would appear to be taking.

While the company also sells home entertainment and security systems, it intends its 4Home Energy management systems to connect with utilities through Sensus's smart meters.

4Home has raised about $7.5 million from investors including Pond Venture Partners and Parker Price Venture Capital. It has also demonstrated its system using devices and technology from smart meter maker Echelon, SMC Networks and Radio Thermostat Corporation of America.

That may put it in a position to work with Sensus and Radio Thermostat in the U-Snap Alliance, an effort the two have backed to make home energy devices that can be outfitted with modular communications devices (see U-SNAP: Modular Home Energy Communications).