GTM Research and Howard Scott, author of The Scott Report, announce an exclusive partnership and the launch of The GTM Scott AMI Market Tracker, a comprehensive smart grid market service that covers utility and vendor advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) deployments and market shares in North America.

The partnership kicks off today with the publication of The North America AMI Deployments & Market Share: 1st Quarter 2012 report. This report details U.S. AMI vendors by shipments and technology for the electric, gas and water sectors, providing strategic analysis on utility AMI trends.

The 1st Quarter 2012 report finds electric AMI markets in North America maintaining steady deployment rates after the industry’s boom year of 2010. AMI vendors shipped over 3.2 million units in the first quarter of 2012, with an additional 10 million units forecasted to be shipped before the end of the year. That compares to 13.5 million shipments in 2011 and 15.7 million in 2010.

FIGURE: Annual Electric AMI Shipments by Vendor

Source: The North America AMI Deployments & Market Share: 1st Quarter 2012

“Over the past five years, the AMI industry has experienced substantial growth and significant changes,” said Howard Scott, Managing Director of Cognyst Advisors. “A large number of smart metering projects were announced prior to 2009. Since then, the flow of announcements has continued, albeit at a slower pace. Of the 145 million electric meters in the U.S., smart meters will replace approximately 62 million by the end of 2012. It appears that this growth trend will continue for the foreseeable future, even though annual shipments have been flat to slightly negative.”

Itron, Sensus and Silver Spring Networks were the clear frontrunners in the first quarter of 2012, capturing a combined 74 percent of the total North American AMI market for electric utilities. These three vendors also lead in cumulative electric AMI market share with 20 percent, 19 percent and 23 percent of total North America shipments, respectively.

“AMI deployment is often the first step in building an effective smart grid infrastructure,” said Rick Thompson, President of Greentech Media. “We’ve partnered with Howard Scott and Cognyst Advisors to bring the most timely and comprehensive AMI data and analysis to our clients as the industry evolves and begins to advance along a maturing growth curve of additional smart grid technologies.”

GTM Research and Howard Scott plan to release multiple reports throughout the remainder of 2012 and beyond, as well as to collaborate on new market research products, industry analysis and data tracking services.

For more information on The North America AMI Deployments & Market Share: 1st Quarter 2012 report, as well as the larger GTM Scott AMI Market Tracker subscription, visit http://www.greentechmedia.com/research/gtm-scott-ami.