E.ON UK provides updates on short-term priorities and building for the long-term with strategic agreement

Monday, 23rd March 2020

Help for customers and colleagues stepped up and kept under continual review as coronavirus pandemic develops

• Extra help offered to customers to assist during coronavirus pandemic
• Additional steps being taken to help colleagues and minimise risk of further transmission in-line with UK Government advice and policies

E.ON UK continues to offer additional help for customers and all colleagues during this difficult time including steps such as suspending any disconnections, making changes to the amount of emergency credit available to those on prepayment meters and suspending non-essential in-home activities for those considered vulnerable and those aged 70 and over.

We are also keeping under review all of our own activities to best support our colleagues as they continue to work to help customers. This includes additional cleaning, hand sanitiser stations and cancelling all non-business critical travel and meetings.

Michael Lewis, Chief Executive of E.ON UK, said: “The challenge we all face from this pandemic is entirely unprecedented and is our foremost concern. We are working hard to make sure we can continue to serve our customers as best we can and also support all of our colleagues. We’ll keep monitoring and adapting to the situation as it develops.”

Customers should visit eonenergy.com/coronavirus-update for further information.

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E.ON UK’s long-term future set out as E.ON and Kraken Technologies announce strategic partnership to build sustainable future for E.ON’s UK residential/SME business

• E.ON UK and Kraken Technologies join forces to build E.ONnext, new entity based on a copy of the future-proof Kraken platform
• EONnext will be customers’ new home: former npower residential and SME customers to be migrated to E.ONnext from Q2 2020, followed by E.ON’s residential and SME customers in 2021
• E.ONnext in a nutshell: sustainability, technology, customer centricity: E.ONnext will enable E.ON to offer sustainable, customer-oriented and cost-efficient products and services through advanced technology

Today (MON), E.ON and Octopus Capital Limited’s subsidiary, Kraken Technologies, announce they have entered a strategic agreement regarding E.ON’s UK residential and SME energy retail businesses. This is the culmination of many months work, and in spite of the unprecedented challenges of the coronavirus pandemic, it underlines E.ON’s long term commitment to the UK and to providing excellent service to customers.

E.ON UK will reinvent itself through building a new, wholly-owned company under the brand E.ONnext, delivering customer-centric and cost-efficient products and services through advanced technology.

In this new entity, a copy of Kraken Technologies’ platform will be deployed to serve former npower residential and SME customers in a first step, and thereafter also E.ON UK’s residential and SME customers. Both E.ON and Kraken Technologies are committed to contributing to a sustainable energy future, accelerating the energy transition and providing great customer service.

COO and Member of the E.ON SE Management Board Karsten Wildberger said:

”E.ON is committed to successfully transforming E.ON UK’s business and undertaking bold steps to use the advantages of the Kraken platform to enable it to be a more customer-centric, technology-led, and cost-efficient organisation. We are convinced this option offers our UK operations a sustainable future as well as bringing significant benefits to the entire Group – not at least by using state-of-the-art technology and processes for the benefit of our customers.”

The key benefits of the partnership with Kraken Technologies are the potential to secure a long-term cost competitive market position in the UK energy retail landscape, to replace E.ON’s current technology platform with a future-proof platform and, most importantly, to continue to deliver easy, transparent, and personalised customer service.

E.ON UK Chief Executive Michael Lewis added:

“We led the transition in the energy industry from fossil fuels to renewables, and today is no less a step to deliver more customer-friendly technology and to help serve our customers better, faster and with greater flexibility for the future energy market.”

In the context of the merger with innogy/npower, updates were provided to npower and E.ON UK colleagues and the market in late 2019 of the strategic changes for the npower business, including the decision to migrate npower’s residential and SME customers to an E.ON platform and subsequently to streamline large parts of npower’s operations. Since that time, the E.ON team has continued to evaluate different platform options which would enable it to deliver a speedy migration of npower customers with uninterrupted service, state-of-the-art technology and a competitive cost to serve.

Under the strategic agreement with Kraken Technologies announced today, E.ON UK has set up a new, wholly-owned subsidiary, E.ONnext, which will leverage Kraken Technologies’ platform to serve former npower residential and SME customers in a first step, and thereafter also E.ON UK’s residential and SME customers. E.ON UK will use a copy of Kraken’s platform and will be able to achieve the great service standards enabled by this advanced technology. Kraken Technologies and E.ON have further agreed to develop the platform to reflect E.ON’s principles underlying the brand E.ONnext, namely customer-centricity and cost efficiency through advanced technology.

Octopus Energy Group Chief Executive and Kraken Technologies Director Greg Jackson points out:

“Our mission is to help deliver lower costs, better service and greener energy globally. E.ON’s decision to use our advanced Kraken technology platform for E.ONnext will enable this for millions of customers in the UK and sets the stage for a wave of change in energy here and globally.”

npower's residential and SME commodity customers will be migrated directly on to the new platform over the next 12 months, guaranteeing stability of service through Kraken Technologies’ migration expertise and adhering to previously defined migration timelines. After the successful completion of the npower customer migration, E.ON UK’s residential and SME customers will also be migrated to the new platform. During the entire migration period, we will ensure that our customers will have a seamless experience and do not need to take any action.

Overall, the ground-breaking agreement with Kraken Technologies is an excellent foundation to create a future-proof, technology-based business.

It further represents a positive outcome for all stakeholder groups:

• Customers will benefit from the great customer experience that E.ONnext can offer with the use of Kraken Technologies’ customer centric platform and E.ON will continue to put customers at the heart of its everyday decision making. All E.ON residential customers will continue to receive electricity supplies backed by 100% renewable sources1as standard and at no extra cost.
• Employees will benefit from new ways of working in customer operations characterized by a high degree of empowerment and agility. Although significant transformation is inevitable, including the already announced streamlining of large parts of npower’s operations, we are convinced that this is the best outcome for our employees. We are proud of the customer experience that E.ON colleagues have delivered with the previous E.ON platform over many years and look forward to enabling colleagues to continue to deliver excellent service through the state-of-the-art Kraken platform in the future.
• E.ON’s shareholders will benefit from a clear path to a competitive cost-to-serve position in the UK.
• Regulators will continue to have a responsible, stable, customer-oriented energy supplier, supporting the UK in the clean energy transformation.

Today’s announcement is fully in line with E.ON’s belief that only companies that undergo a significant transformation will succeed in the new energy market reality. For E.ON, the strategic agreement not only brings short-term financial benefits, but most importantly supports building a sustainable future for E.ON UK’s residential and SME business.

For the entire UK energy market, this is an exciting and transformative step that will help advance the transition into a sustainable energy future. E.ON is strongly committed to embracing this opportunity with the support of Kraken Technologies.

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1 Electricity sourced from E.ON’s renewable generation assets, supply agreements with independent UK wind generators and the purchase of renewable electricity certificates. The electricity supplied to homes and businesses comes from the National Grid.

Notes to editors:

For more information contact:

Andrew Barrow at E.ON on 07515 752759 or andrew.barrow@eon-uk.com

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