Problem
Xcel Energy Retail Services, a wholly owned and unregulated subsidiary of Xcel Energy Company, is chartered to offer energy-related products and services to non-residential customers throughout Xcel Energy's 12-state operating territory. The company is constantly challenged to differentiate its electric and other energy offerings in competitive, deregulated markets.
Services that support basic energy supply are one key differentiator for Xcel Energy Retail Services and the company offers a wide range of products and services that can help maximize efficiency including energy management software packages, as well as energy buy-back programs.
Xcel Energy had implemented several web-based software applications to provide customers with information about energy usage and to pinpoint areas for potential savings. Customers could monitor their energy consumption in real time and could analyze usage patterns and budget for various energy-related expenses.
The challenge for Xcel Energy Retail Services, however, was to integrate these disparate applications into a single web presence that was convenient for customers to access and use. Xcel wanted to retain flexibility and add new services that provide further value to customers.
Solution
Xcel Energy envisioned a portal-style web site as a vehicle to deliver these services to customers. The portal would provide customers with a number of features including:
- Single sign-on to all web applications
- Secure access to each customer's data
- Site personalization so that each customer receives access to all pertinent applications
- Ability to quickly add new applications and content
- Consistent navigation
Xcel Energy Retail Services selected SolutionWire from Coherent Solutions, Inc. to provide the desired application and enhancement services.
SolutionWire's Content Transformation Engine provided an easy-to-use but efficient XML based framework that defined each web application's contents and permitted modification of portions of each page as appropriate. The personalization engine made it extremely easy to manage users and their subscriptions ensuring the best end user experience.
The result was a fully functional portal that was deployed after only three weeks of development effort and testing.