Sector Spotlight: Modernizing Energy Supply, Trading & Risk Management for Power & Utilities

Navigating the Energy Transition: Unique Challenges and Opportunities

The power and utilities sector is at the epicenter of the global energy transition. As decarbonization accelerates, utilities face a landscape defined by regulatory pressures, rapid integration of renewables, evolving consumer expectations, and unprecedented market volatility. The shift from traditional, dispatchable generation to a diverse mix of renewables, storage, and distributed energy resources is fundamentally transforming how utilities manage supply, trading, and risk.

This transformation brings both challenges and opportunities. Utilities must deliver reliable, affordable power while decarbonizing and innovating. They are tasked with integrating intermittent renewables, managing new forms of risk, and complying with evolving regulations—all while maintaining operational excellence and financial performance.

The Case for Modernization: Breaking Down Silos and Enabling Agility

Historically, utilities have relied on a patchwork of legacy Energy Trading and Risk Management (ETRM) systems, manual processes, and siloed data architectures. While these systems were effective for single-commodity, single-market operations, they are ill-suited for today’s interconnected, multi-asset, and multi-jurisdictional environment. The result is a proliferation of data silos, process inconsistencies, and limited automation, which hinder innovation and increase operational risk.

Key challenges include:

Inflexible, commodity-specific, on-premise ETRM systems with overlapping functionalities
Data silos and limited collaboration tools restricting timely, data-driven trade and risk analysis
Over-customized, complex system architectures that are costly to support and difficult to integrate
Manual intervention in data aggregation, analysis, and reporting, increasing the risk of human error
Slow pace of modernization, hampering the ability to optimize and support the energy transition

To thrive, utilities must move beyond incremental improvements and embrace holistic digital transformation—building unified, data-centric ecosystems that enable real-time analytics, automation, and AI-driven decision support across both traditional and green power portfolios.

The Publicis Sapient and Microsoft Approach: A Data-Centric Digital Ecosystem

Publicis Sapient, in partnership with Microsoft, is helping leading utilities reimagine their supply, trading, and risk management landscape. Our approach centers on creating a connected, cloud-based digital ecosystem that breaks down silos, streamlines business processes, and unlocks the value of data across the front, middle, and back office.

Key Value Drivers

Agility: Real-time access to data and insights enables rapid response to market changes and new opportunities.
Collaboration: Integrated workflows and a single source of truth foster cross-functional teamwork and innovation.
Visibility: End-to-end transparency across the value chain supports portfolio optimization and sustainability goals.
Efficiency: Automation reduces manual effort, mitigates risk, and frees up resources for higher-value activities.
Innovation: Advanced analytics, AI, and machine learning power next-generation decision support and portfolio optimization.

Architectural Foundation

Unified Commercial Analytics Platform: Centralizes data from trading, pricing, operations, and accounting, enabling real-time scenario modeling and cross-functional collaboration.
Service and Integration Layer: Leverages AI and low-code tools to create next-generation business services and digital user channels.
Cloud-Native Infrastructure: Scalable, secure, and future-proof, supporting rapid deployment of new capabilities and integration with external data sources.

AI-Driven Decision Support and Automation

Modern ETRM platforms, built on Microsoft Azure and enhanced by Publicis Sapient’s industry expertise, unlock a new era of automation and AI-driven analytics. Utilities can:

Streamline trade lifecycle management: Automate repetitive tasks, reduce errors, and accelerate deal cycles
Predict demand and optimize asset utilization: Machine learning models forecast market trends and suggest optimal responses
Enhance risk modeling and scenario analysis: AI-driven tools simulate the effects of market changes, supply disruptions, or new regulations
Automate compliance and reporting: Unified audit trails and automated checks minimize regulatory and operational risk

These capabilities are essential for managing the complexity of renewables integration, balancing supply and demand in real time, and responding to regulatory and market shifts with agility.

Real-World Impact: Sector-Specific Case Studies

1. Standardizing and Optimizing Renewables Trading for a Global Utility

A multinational energy company, one of the world’s largest offshore wind power generators, set an ambitious goal to be climate-neutral by 2040. With a rapidly expanding renewables portfolio, the company needed to integrate commercial capabilities from multiple acquisitions, standardize systems and processes, and enable asset optimization across geographies.

Solution: Publicis Sapient and Microsoft delivered an integrated, end-to-end Trade to Cash business solution, leveraging a standardized ETRM platform and a phased integration roadmap. The approach prioritized long-term trading, rapid enablement of critical risk management controls, and automation of settlement and invoicing.

Business Impact:

Streamlined and standardized business process framework for North American operations
Centralized certificate management for operational efficiency
Automated settlement and invoicing
Significant increase in trading P&L through advanced optimization models
Foundation for global risk and revenue modeling

2. Consolidating Wholesale and Retail ETRM for a Power & Gas Company

A fully integrated North American Power & Gas business, active in both trading and marketing to retail and commercial/industrial customers, faced the challenge of integrating acquisitions, improving operational efficiency, and enabling consistent reporting of complex positions.

Solution: Publicis Sapient designed and implemented a consolidated ETRM platform, integrating exchanges, pricing systems, ISOs, and ERP systems. Automation replaced manual spreadsheet reporting, and data migration tools ensured data quality and consistency.

Business Impact:

Consolidated ETRM systems for wholesale and commercial/industrial business
Managed renewable identification numbers, power purchase agreements, and derivatives in a unified view of exposure and risk
Enhanced forecasting accuracy and reduced margin leakage
Improved customer experience and analytics
Strengthened operational controls and data governance

The Transformation Journey: From Tactical to Strategic Value

Modernizing supply, trading, and risk management is a journey, not a one-time project. Publicis Sapient and Microsoft guide utilities through a proven transformation framework:

Automate and Decouple: Eliminate manual tasks, decouple legacy systems, and migrate to the cloud for efficiency and scalability.
Enable Real-Time Insights: Centralize and contextualize data, enabling real-time analytics and AI-driven decision support.
Optimize and Innovate: Automate and optimize front-to-back office activities, enable scenario analysis, and unlock new business models (e.g., carbon trading, new energies).
Monetize Intelligence: Leverage unified data and AI to create new revenue streams, from data products to algorithmic trading and beyond.

Why Publicis Sapient and Microsoft?

With decades of experience in digital business transformation and deep sector expertise, Publicis Sapient and Microsoft are uniquely positioned to help utilities navigate volatility, regulatory change, and the energy transition. Our joint approach combines:

Industry-leading cloud and AI technologies
Proven frameworks for data-centric digital ecosystems
Agile, outcome-driven delivery
A track record of success with global power and utilities leaders

Ready to Reimagine Your Power & Utilities Future?

The future belongs to utilities that can harness digital innovation to drive agility, efficiency, and growth. Whether you are looking to modernize legacy systems, break down data silos, or unlock the power of AI and cloud, Publicis Sapient and Microsoft can help you define and realize your digital vision.

Contact our Energy & Commodities team at energyandcommodities@publicissapient.com to start your transformation journey.

Publicis Sapient is a digital business transformation partner helping established organizations get to their future, digitally-enabled state. We fuse strategy, consulting, and customer experience with agile engineering and problem-solving creativity. Learn more at publicissapient.com.

Relevant Links