Digitizing Utilities Prize
The American-Made Digitizing Utilities Prize is a multimillion-dollar competition designed to advance grid reliability and resiliency by catalyzing electric utilities to tackle data and digitization challenges.
Prize Background
Recent advancements in the energy industry have enabled utilities to collect more data than ever before, challenging traditional methods of data acquisition, use, and storage. The Digitizing Utilities Prize aims to develop software solutions to improve how the energy industry manages, stores, and processes these large datasets.
The Digitizing Utilities Prize supports the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) commitment to accelerating research, development, and demonstration of new technologies and tools within the electricity sector to advance reliable, resilient, and affordable power.
Structured for Success
Digitizing Utilities Prize competitors form interdisciplinary teams of utilities and other energy sector partners with software developers, data experts, and risk and decision scientists to transform digital systems and data analytics for electric utilities.
Competitors develop software solutions through various tracks in two phases: Plan and Progress.
- Phase 1 – Plan: Software developers, engineers, and/or data scientists form interdisciplinary teams with energy sector partners to identify a utility challenge and propose a solution.
- Phase 2 – Progress: Winning teams from Phase 1 implement their solutions over roughly six months. Teams must demonstrate how their methods and processes could be used by other utilities in the future.
The prize invites individuals and groups to form teams with energy sector partners. This approach will drive the accelerated development of the most promising ideas.
Prize Partners
DOE is committed to pushing the frontiers of science and technology, and catalyzing energy innovation and domestic job creation through research, development, demonstration, and deployment. DOE’s Office of Electricity, in partnership with other offices, funds the Digitizing Utilities Prize to strengthen and modernize our nation’s power grid, increasing the competitiveness of the U.S. electric sector.
Connecting You to the American-Made Network
The American-Made Network provides support to Digitizing Utilities Prize competitors throughout the competition and is composed of national labs, incubators, investors, facilities, and seasoned industry mentors. The American-Made Network strengthens and scales the critical connections needed to grow new businesses, develop solutions, and sustain American innovation.
Connect to the NetworkWho Can Compete?
Are you a data or utilities innovator? You belong here. Anyone with a groundbreaking idea to digitize the energy sector can help advance the electric grid through the American-Made Digitizing Utilities Prize. Competitors are teams of utilities or energy sector partners and software developers and data experts legally residing or based in the United States.
Compete in the PrizeSolutions that help shape the future
Are you a thinker, entrepreneur, or potential partner? Anyone with an innovative idea can participate in the American-Made Challenges.
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