This month’s Smart Grid Index (SGI) results show that overall Smart Grid sentiment increased by one percentage point in March, to 72%, which is the highest it’s been since the survey began in November of 2012. However, both utility and vendor sentiment decreased this month. Fifty-two percent of all respondents said they expect Smart Grid hiring to increase over the next 12 months. Forty-one percent of the vendors surveyed closed a new deal last month, while 75% of utilities expect to submit new Smart Grid proposals for budget approval over the next year.

The outlook for global investments in Smart Grid technologies has increased steadily since December of 2012.

As data management and analytics take center stage in 2013, we asked executives if utilities were prepared to handle the volumes of data that will be produced from Smart Grid enabled devices. Fifty-eight percent said utilities were not prepared, 28% percent said they were, while the remaining 14% were not sure.

Methodology

This study was conducted by Zpryme and FierceSmartGrid by surveying 218 Smart Grid executives from March 1st to March 18th of 2013. The survey was conducted online. Percentages may not add up to 100 due to rounding. Three groups were used to inspect for differences: vendors (59% of sample), utilities (18% of sample), and total sample.

April Survey

April’s survey will be fielded from April 1st to April 17th of 2013. Utilities and Smart Grid vendors are encouraged to participate.

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