Industry: Utilities
Today's issue: Digital Transformation
Country: Canada
Our client—a large Canadian utility providing power generation, transmission and distribution services to millions of customers—wanted to enhance their data governance to enable compliance with new regulations and better protect the privacy of their customers, while also harnessing the power of their data to improve the efficiency of their operations and drive more value from their existing assets and infrastructure.
For over two years, we’ve worked with this utility’s Data Office and a number of their business stakeholders to transform their goals into reality. Our advisory team helped them recognize the importance of taking an integrated approach—including technology, data governance and processes—to drive their ambitious data strategy forward.
Our relationship with Microsoft has played a significant role in our work, helping us accelerate and streamline this utility’s data transformation journey and enable them to get the most value from their Microsoft solutions and tools.
Two years ago, our client was deeply concerned that they would not be able to meet the rapidly rising energy demands of their customers, unless they took into account the monitoring of actions and implications related to the adverse impacts of energy demand's seismic shifts.
Given the complexity, cost and time required to upgrade their generation, transmission and distribution infrastructure, this utility needed to get more value from the assets they already had. This led our client to prioritize their data strategy, believing that if they could unlock the power of their customer and operations data, they could drive significant efficiencies in their operations and management of their existing assets.
Our client wasn’t new to digital transformation. Prior to working with our team, they’d already migrated much of their data to the cloud, putting them in a good position for their AI transformation Journey. They had also already committed to using Microsoft as their operational foundation, and were leveraging Microsoft Azure and data analytics platforms. Their key challenge came down to resources. They didn’t have the people or the data governance expertise they needed to catalyze their data strategy efforts and build the right foundation for making critical long-term decisions without compromising data privacy.
This utility knew they needed help. They were drawn to PwC Canada because of our energy and utilities expertise, our extensive knowledge of data governance and our experience with Microsoft solutions. That’s why they decided to work with us.
While our client was initially interested in data governance, they quickly recognized that their organization needed a broader array of support. This led our team to establish a number of workstreams ranging from data governance and data architecture to data quality and change management, each focused on helping our client establish the foundation and internal capabilities they needed to forge ahead with their ambitious data strategy.
Over the next two years, we worked with this utility on a number of initiatives, including several projects where we collaborated directly with Microsoft. While we tailored our approach to the needs of each unique project, the core principles of our approach never changed:
As a result of our work, our client now looks at many aspects of their business differently. They better understand how data infrastructure, governance, and processes work together to provide the foundation needed to enable critical, sustainable and forward-thinking decisions. Our client’s Data Office is also better equipped to show business users how specific initiatives—like mapping critical data elements, roles and responsibilities, and other structures—enable business use cases and contribute to value creation.
Over the course of our work together, this utility has also come to view us as a trusted advisor in their data transformation journey—a trust that extends to the C-Suite.
While we continue to work with our client on a number of projects—most recently, pilot testing AI and GenAI capabilities and establishing a framework for identifying critical data—they have already been able to establish the building blocks needed to empower their end users with Generative AI capabilities to make sustainable and strategic operational decisions. Looking forward, they are well-positioned to meet the objectives set out in their GenAI and data transformation strategy.
Over the course of our initial work with this utility, we were able to demonstrate our industry specializations and capabilities as a firm alongside forging our strategic alliance with Microsoft and leveraging their cutting-edge technology solutions, allowing us to build long-term commitments and trust with the organization.
We worked collaboratively to help our client make the most of their commitment to Microsoft’s technology stack and ecosystem, empowering them to take advantage of new energy transition and technology opportunities as they arise. Our intended ‘client-first’ approach has not only allowed us to help maximize value for our client, but also enabled our client to make change more sustainably by harnessing the power of PwC Canada and Microsoft. Together, we're driving innovation and delivering unparalleled solutions across the energy sector.
Overall, our three-way collaboration is helping position our client as a leader in the utilities space within the realm of data governance, management and Generative AI, giving them the capabilities and tools needed to drive more efficiencies out of their energy assets in the years to come.
TORONTO, April 3, 2024 – PwC Canada is among the first Canadian organizations to implement generative AI tools and technology organization-wide, with the deployment of Copilot for Microsoft 365 for the entire organization of 8,000 people.
TORONTO, Monday, May 29, 2023 — PwC Canada has announced plans to invest $200M over the next three years to expand and scale its artificial intelligence (AI) offerings and help clients reimagine their businesses through the power of generative AI.
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