Platform selection

Choosing a Utility Billing and Customer Platform

Kraken, Kaluza, SAP, Oracle, Gentrack and Salesforce, compared honestly. An independent, vendor neutral guide to picking the right customer and billing platform, from a team with nothing to sell you.

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6major platforms compared honestly
£249mof platform migrations delivered
19 yrsacross every major system
Independentof every vendor
Why us

Platform advice from someone with nothing to sell

Almost every comparison of utility platforms is written by a vendor or an integrator paid to land one of them. We hold no licence, no reseller agreement and no commission, so we can tell you plainly which platform fits your data, your operating ambition and your delivery capacity, and then make the migration land. We have delivered and recovered migrations onto and between these platforms, including the first ever water utility onto Kraken and an Oracle to SAP S/4HANA migration at national scale.

The options

The platforms at a glance

A plain summary of where each platform fits. For the detail on any one, follow through to its page, and for the deepest look at the big three see our Kraken versus SAP versus Oracle comparison.

PlatformOrigin and modelBest fitWhere the risk sits 
KrakenOperating model with software, built by OctopusRetailers chasing a lower cost to serve and ready to changeNewer platform, migration partly shaped by the licensorView →
KaluzaReal time platform built by OVO, Kraken’s rivalRetailers wanting real time and flexibility at scaleYounger and fast moving, a migration you must controlView →
SAP S/4HANA UtilitiesIS U successor, full featured suiteSAP estates wanting continuity before the 2027 deadlineA reimplementation in all but nameView →
Oracle UtilitiesEstablished customer care and billing suiteOracle estates wanting continuity, proven at scaleLarge, integrator led and data heavyView →
Gentrack and JuniferUK and ANZ billing and customer systemsEnergy and water retailers across the UK, Ireland and ANZConsolidation and clean data migrationView →
Salesforce E&U CloudCRM led customer engagement layerUtilities wanting the customer at the centreFitting CRM to billing and usage dataView →
And the rest

Specialist and regional platforms

Beyond the big names we also work with specialist billing systems such as Hansen and Itineris, and with the regional platforms your market uses. The destination matters less than the discipline: whatever you choose, the migration has to move live customer and billing data cleanly, change the operating model to match, and land a rehearsed cutover.

THE PEF APPROACHAssurance and control at every stage1AssessIndependent readiness and risk review2SafeguardCommercial and contractual protection3MobiliseThe right operating model and team4DeliverControlled, closely governed delivery5AssureIntegrity proven before go live6RealiseStabilised, with benefits secured
After the choice

Assurance or full integration on whichever platform you choose

Choosing the platform is the first step, not the last. Once you have chosen, we can work in two parts.

Part A: assurance

Independent assurance of the vendor and integrator through readiness, design, data migration, testing and go live, so the board always has an honest view.

Part B: full integration

We lead the full integration of the new platform with your meter data, payments, finance and CRM, and take the migration, testing, cutover and hypercare through to a stable service.

Kraken, Kaluza, SAP, Oracle, Gentrack or Salesforce

The two parts apply to every platform in this guide, not just Kraken. We hold no licence for any of them.

Track record

We have delivered across the lot

Delivered the Oracle to SAP S/4HANA migration on the National Grid separation, more than 22 million assets.
Led the first ever migration of a water utility onto Kraken, recovering a programme twelve months behind.
Recovered a billing imbalance of more than £160 million after a platform migration.
Delivered a UK utility migration 65 days ahead of plan and to budget.
Delivered pretty much every major finance and billing system over 19 years, independently of all of them.
FAQ

Questions we are asked

Which platform is best?

There is no single best platform, only the best fit for your data, your operating ambition and your delivery capacity. That is the judgement we help you make, independently.

Do you earn anything if we pick a particular platform?

No. We have no reseller agreements and take no commission from any vendor. You pay us to get the decision and the migration right, nothing else.

Can you run the migration once we have chosen?

Yes. We can select independently, then plan, run, assure or recover the migration, or hold assurance over an integrator who delivers it.

How do Kraken, SAP and Oracle compare in detail?

See our in depth independent comparison of Kraken, SAP S/4HANA Utilities and Oracle.

Choosing or migrating a utility platform?

Get an independent read before you commit, from people who have delivered the hardest migrations in the sector.

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