Shannon based Smart Grid technology company FMC-Tech has been selected as a partner of GE as part of GE’s $200 million global ecomagination Challenge: Powering the Grid. The Challenge, launched on July 13th, 2010, was created to find and fund ideas to accelerate the development and deployment of power grid technology.
In this first round of Challenge announcements, GE and its Challenge venture capital partners announced $55 million has been committed for investment. FMC-Tech was one of 12 technologies selected from a pool of nearly 4,000 ideas from 150 countries that took part in the 10 week innovation Challenge.
“Since its incorporation, FMC-Tech has had the support of three key investors, Enterprise Equity, The Western Development Commission and Enterprise Ireland. This new partnership is an important endorsement of the technology the company has developed, and reflects the enormous interest in the US and globally in Smart Power Grid systems. GE’s ecomagination Challenge provides FMC-Tech with the perfect partnership opportunity to take our technology to the next level,” explains Mike McCormack, managing director of FMC-Tech,.
“FMC-Tech is a great example of the innovative solutions being developed in Ireland especially in the energy management and power grid sectors. Enterprise Ireland has been delighted to support the exciting R&D work FMC-Tech has undertaken over the past eight years, this partnership with GE is a significant milestone for our client company,” says Enterprise Ireland director for North America, Gerry Murphy.
In its recent Grid 2030 Report, the US Department of Energy outlined a vision for the construction of a 21st century electric system, integrating advanced functionality with enhanced reliability, functionality and security. The use of information age technologies will be a key to delivering on that vision. FMC-Tech’s System has been at work in other countries such as the UK, Sweden and Poland and is well placed to contribute to the goals of the US Department of Energy and GE.
FMC-Tech was set up for the purpose of developing a new network management system, for medium voltage overhead electricity networks. The development brief was to provide a complete solution to improve customer satisfaction and meet regulatory demands both present and future, by delivering network intelligence, while at the same time reducing costs. Testing and evaluation of the system has been carried out at various stages in the project, and following the successful completion of its product development there are now 12 sites installed in Ireland, the UK, Sweden, and Poland.