Ignitis & Energy Management: All-in-one, one-for-all, wired for the future

Ignitis, the leading utility provider in Lithuania, has a singular, noble mission: Define the future of simple, convenient energy services and offer them to the energy users of today. So if you are curious about what the relationship between energy suppliers and energy users will look like tomorrow, look no further than Ignitis and its 0.9 million household customers. 

At Eliq, we also have an idea of what the future of energy interactions will look like and we wanted to check our notes with a trusted partner, Ignitis. We spoke with Justas Kersnauskas, B2C Product Manager at Ignitis Lietuva, to get inspired with tangible solutions to today’s energy supplier-energy user relationship.

 

 

 

The ignition key: Real-time dynamic tariffs

Ignitis released dynamic tariffs based on energy spot prices in 2022 as a response to the push for intra-day real-time pricing. While dynamic pricing implementation jolted most of the energy industry, Ignitis is championing it. Justas expects that dynamic pricing will transform energy use into another form of investment:

“In terms of directives and regulations, everything is moving closer and closer to real-time. I expect that 10 years into the future, everything will be literally real-time. We’re seeing a lot of push for demand-side response programs where end users can even earn money by being involved.”

As Justas goes on to explain, Ignitis is keen to enable this transformation with a complete infrastructure for customers to access dynamic tariffs and track energy in the same way they track financial investments.

Ignitis’s customer base championed dynamic pricing as much as the company itself. The initial customer uptake of this tariff was quite enthusiastic, capturing between 18-20% of the entire user base of 0.9 million customers. Ignitis aspires for this pattern to continue with strong communication efforts and a trickle-down effect from the early adopters. In addition, Ignitis plans to introduce the pinnacle phase of dynamic pricing  in the autumn of 2025: The 15-interval dynamic tariff.

Between two gears: Innovation and customer engagement

Dynamic pricing is just one of the vessels to transforming energy services but it mobilised Ignitis to future-proof the customer relationship altogether. Justas describes the current state of the transformation as two-speed. On one hand, energy offers and capabilities are developing rapidly; on the other hand, there is still ground to cover in bringing consumers up to the same speed. 

“High-consumption devices are on the rise and energy users should have access to services that allow them to get the best possible outcome without too much effort. With the introduction of the new 15-minute plan, energy use needs even closer management. Customers need insights that are as dynamic as their tariff and allow them to manage their energy as comfortably, independently and as much as possible.”

As Justas acknowledges, bringing energy users up to the same speed in a customer-centric way is a balancing game. As he goes, Justas bravely articulates what every energy professional knows and thinks: Energy is not easy, but very interesting. 

“Energy management is difficult and complex and end users don’t think about it daily. But if you really want to save money and consume energy efficiently today, you need to be on top of everything happening daily. Surely, an educated user is the ideal user but energy is not a fancy product – psychologically, people are not inclined to dive deeper to chase more information.”

“We are aware that end users don’t have an innate reason to dive deep into their energy usage so we wanted to make this as easy as possible so that the end user doesn’t have to pay too much attention to it.”

A problem well-stated is a problem half-solved. So, how does the other half of the solution look like? What is “as easy as possible” in energy management?

Digital energy management: A simple shift for a complex challenge

Ignitis has the aptitude and experience to already adapt to a shifting landscape. To deliver a simple solution to a complex challenge, Ignitis doubled down on its digital efforts: An all-in-one, one-for-all digital service point. Justas takes us behind the scenes of Ignitis’s digital project plan.

“We want to combine all the possible energy activities in a singular hub, an all-inclusive digital energy service, where the customers know exactly what they are using, when, and why, and how they can best use electricity at any given moment. Essentially, we want to provide the infrastructure – the insights, the knowledge and the necessary base– for users to make conscious and smart decisions without spending too much time on research or following up on actions.”

With the specs identified, Ignitis moved on to exploring the how. We asked Justas directly: Considering that the prerequisites of long experience and an innovative mindset are ticked, did Ignitis entertain the thought of building these functionalities in-house?

“Developing an algorithm that uses just the 15-minute smart meter intervals to calculate the consumption mix, the devices used and the time of usage with a 95 to 99% accuracy is no joke. We discussed it internally and estimated that it would take us two or three years to develop something like this from scratch. So we concluded to partner up with somebody who is already excelling in this field.”

That conclusion led Ignitis to partner up with Eliq to deliver these advanced energy management functionalities. However, as Justas tells us, selecting Eliq’s platform for energy insights was a decision taken with their customers and their quality of interaction in mind.

“What Eliq brought to the table, just from the first impressions, is that crisp, professional, and welcoming look. You can’t really explain it with words, but you find it in some tech products where you look at them and you can instantly tell, this is quality. And to this day, we trust Eliq. I’ve never had any issues with any deadlines missed or any promises undelivered. That’s what you want from a partner.”

Energy Insights: An omnibus for energy users

Eliq’s energy insights were integrated into Ignitis’s digital infrastructure in late 2022. But did customers get the same quality feeling? Justas explains that customers definitely concurred on their favourite types of insight:

“People are keenly interested in additional insights that come with their consumption – and not just those on hourly tariffs. Basically, every user that joined the application has tried the disaggregation feature – what devices are the biggest consumers, what activity is above the mark? And on this, the favourite is Similar homes. Obviously people like to compare themselves and seeing how you actually perform corresponds to that high interest. It’s almost like a game, and the more we employ gamification principles, the more people enjoy managing their energy consumption.”

Justas shared some special success stories with us. As he describes, a customer spotted some unusually high consumption compared to last year and noticed the heating peaking at odd hours. This prompted the customer to service their heating system and discover a calcified boiler. Other customers noticed energy consumption linked to irrigation in unexpected hours and identified burst pipes. 

With a conversion rate between 50-60%, the data confirms: Customers find value in energy insights and engage more with their consumption. But as the initial problem identification showed, Ignitis does not settle on solving just the challenges of today. The future Ignitis envisions is radically customer-centric, with empowered independent, engaged users.

“The ideal customer is happy being with us because we’re doing everything we can to make our services as perfect and affordable as possible. Customers will feel secure and equipped to join smart controllers and home energy management systems. Ideally, digitally inclined customers do not have to directly interact with us as a provider at all. They will be able to do everything through the digital services we provide.”

In 2025, Ignitis is still the leading provider of energy insights in Lithuania. As an immediate next step, here’s how Ignitis plans to enhance its digital services to approach this future:

“The service will integrate autonomous control for devices like heat pumps, EV charging, solar panel generation, and eventually batteries. With a service like this, the end users can select an appropriate tariff plan for themselves and we will take care of everything else.”

The future of energy is written today

At Eliq, we share the same vision for the future energy service as Ignitis and that’s what makes them such a dear partner, in vision and in action. If we might be so bold, we’d wish that energy space collectively moves towards this vision. And it fully aligns with Justas’s call to his peers, the energy professionals:

“I know that there’s a lot of concern about how to encourage people to change their habits and their consumption but this shouldn’t function as a roadblock. “

“We know what’s going to happen – we know that renewable energy is picking up rapidly, we know the number of prosumers is growing, we know the grid is becoming more flexible but also more difficult to predict – so let’s embrace this future and prepare for it.  Let’s start looking at end-users as valuable members of the energy system, let’s develop tools and services that will help them become a valuable nod in the mesh.”

This is a truly transformative time in the pages of energy history, and it couldn’t have been described better than Justas’s hail. We sincerely couldn’t be more thrilled to be moving the needle of energy transformation by the side of companies like Ignitis.