Structuring Innovation Efforts for Thermancy

Context

Thermancy supplies pump monitors for use in water pumping stations. Water pumps are extremely energy-intensive; their power consumption is a major cost for water companies, and their overall power consumption is highly sensitive to pump selection decisions by their operators.

The company wanted to improve its service to utility companies by providing pump selection guidance to pumping station operators that could be used together with the readings from their monitors.

Our Process

Although this has the superficial appearance of a technical problem, it is in fact more one of understanding the values, processes and purchasing dynamics of Thermancy’s clients.

The optimisation itself is computationally intensive but, to a large extent, a solved problem, with solutions described in detail in the academic literature. The greater challenge was to be able to use available techniques in a way that could easily be integrated with existing processes, be usable by operators and provide a clear financial benefit that would be valued by purchasers.

Interrogating the problem, we found a tension between the fact that prevailing optimisation techniques were slow and computationally intensive, and yet clients had an operational need for near-instantaneous answers to be delivered in a largely off-line environment. However, we also uncovered three key facts that offered us an advantage. The first was that the underlying dynamics, which were changeable over time, were relatively slow-moving, so would need only occasional calibration. The second was that there was only a limited need for precision in the suggested result. The third was that, in many cases, a range of solutions could be found that would all deliver close-to-optimal results, with no material advantage to picking one over any other. This meant that, in these circumstances, operators could retain significant leeway to factor in secondary considerations, such as the need for each pump to have at least occasional use, or to balance usage between them over time.

We worked with Thermancy to devise an approach of ‘front-loading’ the time-consuming computation by pre-computing solutions at set intervals and populating a large but manageable look-up table for use on-site. This approach was advantageous in that it would work seamlessly offline, enable near-instant results, and eliminate the need for on-site computation or the expensive on-site hardware that would entail. An additional benefit was that this approach also made it easier to support rather than prescribe decisions by operators by providing details of a selection of options, thereby enhancing rather than interfering with their exercise of their own professional judgements.

The drift in pump dynamics could, with this approach, be turned to Thermancy’s advantage too: requiring the company’s periodic involvement in the recalibrating and recomputing of results would not only deliver recurring revenue but also support them in maintaining rich ongoing relationships with clients.

Software development work was commissioned to implement the optimisation and create the necessary components for integration into both Thermancy’s and their clients’ systems.

The Outcome

The software Thermancy developed was hugely simpler than originally envisaged. This made it significantly cheaper and faster to develop, easier to maintain, and easier to integrate with client systems than had been expected. It was immediately usable by operators without additional on-site hardware, training, or significant changes to procedures.

It is now deployed by Thermancy as a standard part of their service, giving them a unique edge with respect to their competitors but also, as hoped, delivering recurring revenue and upkeep of client relationships through the periodic recalibration.

The optimisation has been deployed to and remains in use by major water companies globally.