Utility creates ecommerce services firm

Scottish Power has teamed up with one of the biggest research and engineering companies in the US to build a global ebusiness venture aimed at utility companies.

Based in Glasgow and Chester, the services company will be called Calanais - the name of an ancient Celtic stone circle.

Ownership will be jointly split between Scottish Power and San Diego's Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), which employs more than 39,000 staff worldwide.

As part of the deal, Scottish Power will transfer 400 employees across from its internal IT division, while SAIC will pay the utilities giant about £20m for its share of the business and contribute some 100 staff. A further 100 employees will be recruited locally.

Only last month Scottish Power revealed how was teaming up with two other utilities companies, United Utilities and Northern Electric, to create an internet procurement portal with a combined spending power of £1.6bn. The companies claim that the portal could bring across-the-board savings of at least 10 per cent on everything from pumps to valves.

Under the alliance with SAIC, Scottish Power said it can achieve further savings of £75m over the next five years, in addition to winning some £200m in ebusiness service contracts from other utilities.

David Jones, Scottish Power's chief information officer, said the venture will initially target utility companies in the UK, the US and continental Europe where information management is becoming increasingly complex.

He estimates that about 80 per cent of Calanais' work will be related to the ecommerce needs of client companies, with the rest of its operations focused on customer care and call centre activities.

Scottish Power is the UK's largest quoted electricity company, supplying one in five households with electricity, gas, water or telecommunications services. It also holds a 49 per cent stake in telecoms company, Thus.

First appeared on uk.internet.com