Enefit began transforming its market operations, set plans to develop new smart solutions for energy distribution to the customers, and implementing new tools for collaboration for employees in many locations, several hundred kilometers apart.
Nowadays, businesses in every field are discovering that new digital technologies such as the Internet of Things and Artificial Intelligence are becoming essential to achieving a competitive advantage. Enefit, founded in 1939, has a bold plan to be the leading energy supplier in the entire Baltics region thanks to their cooperation with Microsoft, which began in May 2019.
Innovation for both customers and employees
Enefit believes that to transform its market operations, it needs to begin by becoming more innovative and efficient from the inside. For example, to offer customers more personalized and relevant deals, Enefit employees now use sophisticated customer relationship management tools. Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Azure take advantage of all customer data and help develop new smart solutions for energy distribution to the customers that the competition, relying on traditional methods, simply cannot match.
In the words of Hando Sutter, CEO at Enefit: “We believe that Microsoft technology will provide Enefit with a robust and extendable platform to understand the full customer journey better. From initial contact all the way to personalized services based on each customer’s needs.” However, to ensure success, Sutter also says he had to put the best tools available into the hands of Enefit’s employees.
Enefit has numerous mining, energy production, and distribution operations, a fast-growing fleet of renewable equipment such as wind turbines and solar farms, as well as client management services. Now, the company wants to connect different parts of its business to exchange information and support each other actively. “We saw that we could create an ecosystem to facilitate the fast and secure deployment of next-generation products and services for energy distribution for Enefit partners and customers. And we will also create a truly flexible marketplace and client service platforms. For that, we plan to use the power of Azure,” Sutter explains.
Connected digital workplace allows workers to collaborate from different locations
Enefit, as an organization, has to become as flexible and smart as the services they provide to the customers. Today, empowered employees with lots of flexibility form the most productive teams. Nikita Skitsko, Digital Workplace Service Owner Enefit, says: “We’re divided into up to ten locations, several hundred kilometers apart, and we couldn’t share files or collaborate in real-time before.” He added: “With Microsoft 365, we completely modernized Enefit’s collaboration and communication procedures, increased mobility of our employees, and improved collaboration with our partners.”
The Digital Workplace is the key initiative that enables Enefit not just to work better internally, but also to achieve more in the highly competitive global energy market. Skitsko also refers to saving money and time: “Time was the biggest challenge. We had exactly four months to move 3,000 users off our older platform. That was challenging for us, Microsoft, and partners, but we managed to do it by working hand in hand. Today, as an organization, we have over 4,000 virtual meetings monthly, with at least 11,000 participants in total. As a direct result, we save at least 700,000 euros that would’ve been spent on travel per year.”
