ITEM ENGINEERING SYSTEMS COMPANY PROFILE• ITEM Engineering was established in 2011 with the vision to

provide utilities support with specialized product and service solutions in energy- and water metering

• In 2013 ITEM Engineering partnered with Utility Systems in South Africa as products and solution service provider for the Namibian Market and beyond

• The current products and solutions entails tried and tested technology with over 700 000 electronic flow limitation devices in the field in Southern Africa

• ITEM Engineering has presence in Walvis Bay, Ongwediva and Windhoek

UTILITY SYSTEMS COMPANY PROFILE• Utility Systems was established in 2001 and has vastly

experienced product design and development teams

• Products are built in an ISO 9001 production facility

• Tried and tested technology-over 700 000 electronic flow limitation devices in the field

• Extensive production capacity

• ITEM Engineering & Utility Systems’ vending partner in prepayment metering is Utilities World

• Utilities World is a specialist prepayment vending company with key staff members each having more than 15 years experience in the industry

• Systems comply to the latest standards and specifications, such as STS and XMLVend

• Systems are designed for the on-line environment with industry standard third party integration requirements while taking into account communication technologies available in the environment

PRODUCT OVERVIEW• The Utility Systems product suite comprises of :

– Water Management Device (WMD)– User Interface Unit ( UIU )– Bulk WMD– Aquadata Automated meter reader– Mobile Data Collector (MDC) – Data Bridge Application (DBA)– Field Support Terminal

(FST)– Point of sale device ( POS )

PREPAYMENT PRODUCTS

WATER MANAGEMENT DEVICE (WMD)• Is an electronically controlled valve which is

connected to a third party pulse output water meter

• Reads pulses from a mechanical meter, converting “ dumb ‘ metering technology into a state of the art digital communicating metering system

• Is extremely cost effective, offering AMR, AMI and prepayment at low cost

• In prepayment mode a User Interface unit (UIU) is installed in the customer’s premises and is linked to the WMD by means of short range radio

BULK WATER MANAGEMENTDEVICE (Bulk WMD)• The Utility Systems Bulk WMD is available in several diameter

options with all the same functionality as the WMD

• The electronics from the WMD are essentially adapted into larger valves, so as to make the WMD available in the following dimensions :

– 25mm– 40 mm – 50 mm

AQUADATA AUTOMATEDMETER READER• The AQUADATA automated meter reader is able to be retrofitted

to be installed with most makes of pulse output water meter

• It provides accurate digital meter readings by radio signal to drive by /walk by or fixed network data collectors

• Some salient features– 15 year battery life but very well priced– Offers leak and tamper detection– Has all the other features of the Water Management

Device, save for the valve– Ideal for more affluent areas and gated communities

COMMUNICATION– The system makes use of radio communications

between the Water Management Device (WMD)and a Mobile Data Collector (MDC)

– The MDC then transfers the data from the WMD via a Data Bridge

– into the water service provider’s prepayment system by means of a flat file import

VENDING OPTIONS• The prepayment system allows a number of options for the

consumer to acquire credit for the meter, should the utility implement them.

• Utilities are not locked into proprietary vending system as the solution is an STS, open standard based product .

• Being a numeric token based system vending may be distributed widely using any medium such as SMS, internet, ATM

• The Standard Transfer Specification ( STS ) protocols were developed for prepayment electricity and are now an IEC standard (IEC 62055-41, IEC 62055-51)

• Utilities World Transact™ system

– On-line single database solution

– Web based interfaces

– STS certified

– XMLVend standard based for simple 3rd party integration

– Supports arrears collection, fixed charges, block tariffs

– PC based vending units connect over LAN/WAN/internet

– POS units connect over internet

– Third parties (banks/Post Office etc.) connect over internet/VPN

VENDING OPTIONS

VENDING ARCHITECTURE EXAMPLE

• Web interface • Can be secured by SSL certificate• User access according to profile• Add/edit customers• Manage tariffs

• Manage users• Manage infrastructure• Issue and SMS engineering tokens• View reports

MANAGEMENT CLIENT

• Reports easily customisable by SQL dba or similar

• Standard reports include– Low/no Purchase, Cash Collection, Sales by Area,

Transactions by VU/Customer, Month Management Summary

• All reports exportable to Excel, PDF etc

• Set up auto-mailer to send key reports to staff based on a reporting schedule

REPORTS

• Sell water

• Collect account payments

• Collect arrears– Min payment per month– Percentage

• Secured by mutually authenticated SSL. User name and password

• Will run on GPRS connection

• Auto update of web application over the air

PC BASED VENDING

• Sell water

• Collect arrears– Min payment per month– Percentage

• Runs on GPRS connection

• Limited to sales and minimum arrears payments only

POS VENDING

• Targeted at closed communities that are responsible for their own revenue collection

LOCAL DATA COLLECTION

REMOTE DATA COLLECTION

• Sales are made from the Utility server

– Sales data is real time

• Feedback data is collected from the WMD using drive-by or via a concentrator and GSM

• Feedback data is loaded to the vending system

– Sales vs consumption reporting

– Leak, tamper, valve status

PROCESS / DATA FLOW

• The USC product range has approval from the NRCS (formerly the SABS) UNDER SANS 1529-9 for both Flow Limitation and Prepayment

• The prepayment approval is under class C, and not class B as with other products.

• It also has approval from the STS Association in compliance with IEC 62055-41 and IEC 62055-51 for prepayment.

• Approval numbers are as follows– SA 842– SA1453– SA 1491– SA 1490– STS Certificate No STS-249

APPROVALS

• A WMD is a management tool that can ensure that utilities– Detect leaks– Detect tamper and by pass– Perform accurate real time water balancing for audit

purposes- no more estimations– Reduce unaccounted for water loss and non

revenue water• Data is exported in a .csv format “ flat file “ so can be

– seamlessly integrated into existing systems such as SAP and Venus

– extrapolated into Microsoft spreadsheets– imported into the IMQS system.

BENEFITS

• An STS based system– Can select from other STS vendors for both vending

and meters– Not locked in to a proprietary system– Distributed vending options make purchasing

convenient for customers– Not having a physical token carrier allows for

transmission of credit vouchers over multiple channels

• SMS• Internet

BENEFITS

THANK YOU.