ABB Taps Itron Technology for Charlottesville Project; $4.1 Million Turnkey Project Will Automate Nearly 30,000 Water And Natural Gas Meters.

Business Editors

SPOKANE, Wash.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 16, 2000

ABB Water Meters Inc. will implement Itron (Nasdaq:ITRI) automatic meter reading technology as part of a territory-wide meter replacement and automation project for the city of Charlottesville, Virginia, Itron announced today.

After a nine-month technology and performance investigation, the City of Charlottesville, Virginia, has awarded a $4.1 million product and installation contract to ABB Water Meters, Inc., Ocala, Florida, for replacement and upgrade of water and gas meters and conversion to an Itron mobile meter reading system. In response to Charlottesville's RFP, ABB, the primary contractor, assembled a team that brings together ABB Water Meters, Inc., Itron Inc., American Meter, Inc., and Fieldtech for the project.

The Charlottesville project combines 13,000 new ABB water meters fitted with integral mounted radio transmitters supplied by Itron Inc.; 2,700 new gas meters supplied by American Meter; 13,500 gas meter retrofits; and 16,200 Itron gas meter modules; as well as drive-by reading equipment and software supplied by Itron. Installation, which will be performed by Fieldtech, begins this month and will take place over a nine-month period. The project will incorporate Itron DataPac(R) transportable meter reading technology and Itron MV-RS host system software.

Brock Strickler, utility billing manager for the city of Charlottesville, said elimination of estimated reads and improving customer service were the key drivers in the city's decision to implement automated metering technology as part of the project.

"People just do not like estimated reads," said Strickler. "While our percentage of estimated reads typically ranges between 10 and 12 percent each month, inclement weather can push that figure to more than 20 percent. By working with ABB and implementing Itron meter reading technology, we'll eliminate the problem of estimated reads entirely and provide a higher level of service to all our customers."

Strickler said the system will also streamline operations and improve operational efficiency by enabling the utility to reduce its meter reading staff by 75 percent.

Andrew Alpert, vice president and general manager of Itron's Water and Public Power Business Unit, said municipal water utilities nationwide face unprecedented challenges and automation technology will play a key role in meeting those challenges.

"Competitive pressures, spiraling operating costs, tough clean water standards and conservation needs are changing the rules for water utilities," Alpert said. "These dynamic forces are demanding that water utilities nationwide manage their operations and resources more efficiently and effectively than ever before. Itron and ABB Water Meters are partnering to provide the city of Charlottesville with the technology and knowledge needed to meet critical objectives in this dynamic environment."

ABB Water Meters, Inc. is a company within the Automation segment of ABB. ABB is the world's leading water meter manufacturer. ABB is a global engineering and technology company serving customers in automation; power transmission and distribution; oil, gas and petrochemicals; building technologies; and financial services. ABB's U.S. operations employ over 16,000 people in 40 states. Worldwide, the ABB Group reported 1999 revenues of $26 billion and employs 160,000 people in more than 140 countries.

Itron Inc. is a leading provider to the energy and water industry of solutions for collecting, analyzing and applying information about electric, gas and water usage. Itron technology touches more than $200 billion in energy and water transactions annually in North America. Today, Itron systems are installed at approximately 2,000 utilities in over 45 countries around the world and are used to collect data from 275 million electric, gas and water meters. Of those, more than 600 customers are using Itron's radio and telephone-based technology to automatically collect the information from 16 million meters. Itron technology has also recently been chosen by a number of wholesale energy markets in the U.S. and Canada to provide critical billing and settlement systems for those deregulating markets.