Disruptive Technologies

tiko Energy Solutions is a dynamic and innovative scaleup with operations in Europe and Australia and offices located in Zürich, Switzerland, and Milan, Italy. The company believes that the energy revolution will come from the people, for the people. tiko’s solution aims to enact such a change by enabling people to change the way that they consume energy. The company has designed an award-winning Home Energy Management System (HEMS) and a corresponding app which can integrate any residential devices, independently of their brand, generation and model and connects them in one place. This empowers end-customers to better control and optimize their energy consumption and save money. 

The devices are also connected to tiko’s Virtual Power Plant, which takes advantage of their flexibility in order to generate additional revenue. All of the company's devices and solutions are developed end-to-end by its multicultural team, empowering them to cater to the precise needs of its clients. 

This allows tiko's partners, who range from utilities to electrical device manufacturers and installers, to create hybrid business models where they generate revenue from the sale of both the HEMS and balance energy sold to the grid. 

 

Journey to Trendsetting Success 

tiko Energy Solutions was founded in 2012 just after the Fukushima accident. Swisscom, one of tiko’s investors and the employer of tiko’s co-founders at the time, was asked to contribute to the energy turnaround in Switzerland with the goal of producing 100% of the country’s energy from renewable sources, thus preventing similar nuclear accidents. Additionally, the disruption in the energy industry led to a switch from a centralized supply to a decentralized world with distributed energy resources. As a result, tiko's first priority was to manage and integrate these resources to strike a balance between energy supply and demand.  

The company created a solution to connect existing residential devices such as heat-pumps, batteries, electric car charging stations, and direct heating systems, independent of their age and brand. The company strongly believes that individuals need to change the way they consume energy, and that people already have the resources to do so at home. Surplus energy leads devices connected to the tiko platform to start working a little earlier than their usual cycles would dictate.   

tiko advocates that everyone should be given the means to change and that only “Together we’re stronger”. 

 

An Industry Innovator  

Frédéric Gastaldo reveled in his successful career in the consulting, telecommunication, and manufacturing industries before becoming the co-founder and CEO of tiko Energy Solutions. He shaped the company based on his own belief that as people we can only give our planet a chance to reclaim its grandeur if we alter the way we consume energy. 

The planet is weeping, and we need to act fast. In his words, “As global warming hits the planet in a matter of a couple of human generations, we have an incredibly short period for the entire system to adjust and avoid dramatic consequences.” 

By establishing tiko, Frédéric Gastaldo committed to delivering technologies that can act on reducing CO2 emissions due to our energy consumption. tiko seeks to expand its grasp and reach out to new customer segments. The more devices tiko connects to its platform, the greater impact it will have on the environment. 

Empowering Customers with Transformational Solutions 

The combination of a Home Energy Management System and Virtual Power Plant makes tiko's solution unique and creates innovative business models with the highest security standards. The offer is highly differentiating, and perceived very positively by end-customers, contributing to both acquisition and loyalty strategies. 

To ensure a broader adoption on the market, the company operates under white labeling everywhere outside of its initial market of Switzerland. tiko uses the knowledge that it  acquired in the Swiss market to enable clients to seamlessly and rapidly deploy the company’s solutions and serve their objectives through their brand. 

 

Progressing Towards Tomorrow with Key Partnerships 

tiko is involved in several associations where it tries to bring expertise to ensure that VPP's and digitalization evolve to the next level.  

At present, tiko is part of the following associations:  

  • EU level: smartEn 
  • Germany: BNE, Bundesverband Neue Energiewirtschaft 
  • Switzerland: swisscleantech 

The company also works in close association with different universities, e.g., ETH Zürich, Hochschule Luzern, ZHAW, and others, with whom it shares knowledge and expertise.  

As a result, tiko is working to develop the right solution by answering this need. Companies must take this opportunity to strengthen communities by making them more connected, more resilient, and more inclusive. 

  

Technology Disruption by Innovation in Energy 

tiko’s Virtual Power Plants are disruptive because the concept itself swaps dependencies between the power plants and the users. Users normally fully depend on power plants but VPPs depend on their users. The increase in the market share of renewables is accelerating this dependency swap. 

To top it all off, the HEMS is highly affordable when combined with tiko’s VPP. The engagement of end-customers in the VPP helps to stabilize the grid, thereby promoting the integration of renewable energy into the energy supply. Clients can also take advantage of the affordable HEMS because VPP revenues let them create unique business cases. tiko believes that this is a win-win for all which is the key to commercial success and thus higher adoption rates. High adoption rates mean that more people will control the way they consume energy, which in turn will have a positive impact on the climate. 

Gastaldo is certain that self-consumption optimization can also provide massive benefits. Instead of transmitting energy back and forth (PV overproducing and sending to the grid in the day, then house taking from the grid in the night), local self-consumption optimization can lower the required power plant size and reduce user's costs. 

 

Navigating Through Tough Times 

Upon tiko's creation, the first challenge was to build trust. Although the company's technology was ground-breaking, the concept was unheard of before. No one thought that decentral devices could serve as the basis of highly secure, fast, and reliable grid stabilization products. By providing a fast frequency response to TSOs in Europe, tiko was the first one to show that this was indeed possible. 

The company's second challenge was building valuable and sustainable business cases with its clients. tiko needed to demonstrate what kind of solution it would be able to provide to them and how it would contribute to their portfolios. 

Finally, the last frontier was in carrying out extensive tests in the marketing, installation, and support approaches to deliver an end-to-end, turn-key solution to these clients, and ensuring that they would benefit from the company's experience by achieving success in each collaboration. 

Remarkable Honors and Recognition 

tiko has been recognized with the following awards and nominations. 

  • Most Innovative Smart Energy Management Platform 2020  
  • Top 10 Renewable Energy Solution Providers in Europe 2019  
  • The 10 Best Smart Grid Solution Providers, 2019 
  • Swiss Enterprise Award 2017 - Leading Experts in Energy Management Solutions  
  • Charge Energy Branding Award 2017 
  • Global Energy Award 2017  
  • Energy App Award 2017  
  • Energy Management Award – European Utility Week 2016  
  • Energy Revolution Award – European Utility Week 2016  
  • Top 100 Start-ups 2018 - Global Energy Transition (GET) 100  
  • Top 100 Start-ups 2017 - Global Energy Transition (GET) 100  

The company has also been praised by its clients for its excellent services: one of its clients shared the results of their satisfaction survey, showing excellent results including a global NPS of +27. This means that tiko's clientele is happy to recommend it to their networks and contacts. 

In Switzerland, the company has received support from the Swiss Federal Office of Energy (SFOE) in the form of a Flagship Project for the smart network integration of electrical heating devices. 

In 2019, tiko was chosen by the French energy company ENGIE as a piece of its digitalization strategy and became its main stakeholder. 

Insights into the Future 

Frédéric Gastaldo envisions expanding further geographically and targeting new segments. He believes that tiko’s impact on climate change will grow as they connect more and more devices to its solution. 

tiko’s CEO Frédéric Gastaldo says, “The current pandemic crisis shows us that people’s sense of community is getting stronger, with the need to do something good together, and the need for more control and transparency. Finding new ways to accelerate the energy transition is quickly becoming one of the most important tasks we face as a society. It's only fitting that one of the most promising solutions will see us once again coming together and embracing the idea of community.”