Davra's unmatched flexibility to integrate with any device, vendor, or protocol allowed TLS to unify diverse hardware systems into a seamless, cohesive offering—enabling them to bring their vision to life while accelerating their time to market.

Outcomes

• Disrupted the market with an end-to-end solution compatible with all smart meters.
• Working prototype in 1 week, and won first customer just two months into the project.
• Delivering accurate, real-time billing for utilities and municipalities.
• Saving money and resources by preventing critical events before they happen.
• Detecting 300 liter per hour leaks and helping achieve EU sustainability compliance.

TLS Energimatning AB is a Swedish leader in smart metering technology, specializing in district heating and water utility solutions. Guided by its mission to foster a sustainable future, TLS delivers innovative technical solutions to address critical challenges such as water loss and energy consumption.

With new EU directives on energy consumption (opens new window) and drinking water standards (opens new window), Swedish municipalities and utilities face increasing demands for high-resolution data to ensure accurate billing, efficient network control, and regulatory compliance. One of the most pressing issues is water leakage, with approximately 18% of Sweden's drinking water (opens new window) lost through the distribution network—wasting both water and energy.

To meet these challenges, municipalities and utilities require advanced data and technology to better understand and manage their distribution networks. This includes monitoring customer usage, flow rates, pressure, and water levels. As a result, utilities are turning to providers like TLS for comprehensive solutions that include smart meters, connectivity, and meter data management systems to seamlessly integrate data into their billing platforms.

The Integration Challenge

Meter technology and sensors have evolved significantly over the last decade and provide more data than ever before, with many manufacturers offering wireless connectivity as standard. However, OEM solutions rarely integrate with other manufacturers, resulting in siloed data. This lack of integration increases costs, reduces efficiency, and forces providers to manually consolidate data or juggle multiple software platforms.

We needed a platform flexible enough to integrate with many different kinds of devices. This was the most important thing. That's where Davra came in.

Recognizing this opportunity, TLS set out to develop an innovative end-to-end solution capable of integrating with any hardware. Their vision combined best-in-class metering technology, wireless connectivity, and a cutting-edge application for real-time data monitoring and analysis. However, as a small company needing fast time-to-market to stay ahead of competitors, building the solution in-house was not a viable option.

As a distributor of multiple hardware brands for both water and energy use cases, TLS required a platform capable of integrating with a wide range of devices, using different wireless communication technologies, such as NB-IoT and LoRaWAN, with a variety of protocols including LwM2M, MQTT, and CoAP. Many platforms on the market were too specialized, supporting only one or two types of communication without the flexibility to accommodate others.

Johan Westerberg, CEO of TLS, explains, “We needed a platform flexible enough to integrate with many different kinds of devices. This was the most important thing. That's where Davra came in.”

Building on Davra

After trialing five different platforms, TLS chose Davra as the foundation for its solution. Davra's unmatched flexibility to integrate with any device, vendor, or protocol allowed TLS to unify diverse hardware systems into a seamless, cohesive offering—enabling them to bring their vision to life while accelerating their time to market.

Speed to Market

Davra's Services Team worked closely with TLS to understand their specific use case and build the application to their specifications. This partnership helped TLS achieve an incredibly fast time-to-market. They had a working prototype system in 1 week and secured their first public tender just two months into the project.

Johan praised Davra's customer service, saying, “As a small company, we depend on partners or suppliers that can be close to us and help us in the beginning, and Davra has done that in a great way. 10 out of 10 for Service.”

Predictive Maintenance

TLS's solution provides municipalities and utilities with accurate, high-resolution, real-time data from their smart meters and sensors, significantly improving billing accuracy and reducing reliance on self-reported estimates.

Working with Davra then allowed TLS to identify potential leaks by taking a predictive maintenance approach to manage critical events. Customers can now set up alarms and automations to respond to potential issues, such as leaks, temperature spikes, or other critical scenarios.

Rather than waiting for a pipe to burst, the system identifies potential leaks early, allowing customers to take preventative action, avoiding damage and loss of service.

Leak Detection

Powered by the Davra platform, TLS's system also enables the investigation and identification of leak sources—creating a powerful tool to drive sustainability efforts.

Upon connecting to the Davra platform, TLS immediately identified clear indications of leaks. Testing revealed that leaks were present in 20% of homes, including one case of a leak measuring an astonishing 300 liters per hour.

This breakthrough is made possible by the system's high-resolution data, with water usage typically reported every 10-30 minutes. By monitoring and comparing baseline water usage with peaks during active use, TLS can identify individual properties with leaks.

Leaks reveal themselves as a high baseline consumption with small, steady peaks—akin to having multiple taps open throughout a house. This capability helps detect leaks upstream and downstream from the water meter, giving utilities an unprecedented understanding of their water supply network.

A suspected drip leak. Source: tls.se.

A suspected pipeline leak. Source: tls.se.

TLS plans to take this further using AI capabilities within the platform to train an AI model to automatically detect leaks, fully automating the process. This advancement has the potential to revolutionize water sustainability efforts in Sweden.

A Key Differentiator

TLS's new offering has also become a significant differentiator in the market by meeting the growing demand for customizable solutions. Customers value the ability to work with data in flexible ways, such as creating tailored charts or designing entirely custom applications to meet specific needs.

We have market-leading hardware, and now we have market-leading software as well.

The Davra platform is the backbone of this customization, enabling TLS to deliver highly adaptable solutions that cater to individual client requirements. This agility allows customers to integrate their ideas seamlessly and add new features, setting TLS apart from competitors.

Johan explained, “Our customers have a lot of ideas and want to add features. This is a unique selling point for us compared to our strongest competitors, who do not allow any customization.”

The platform's customization options have been especially appealing to municipalities and larger organizations, where tailored solutions are a key requirement. By offering flexibility, TLS has gained a competitive edge over rivals with more rigid systems.

Conclusion

TLS's partnership with Davra has been instrumental in achieving its business goals, combining market-leading hardware with an equally innovative software platform. Johan Westerberg, CEO of TLS, explained, “Davra is critical to us achieving our business goals. We have market-leading hardware, and now we have market-leading software as well.”

Leveraging the Davra Platform, TLS delivered a cutting-edge, end-to-end solution in record time, winning their first customer just two months into the project. Their solution addresses key challenges faced by Swedish utilities, such as reducing water loss, improving billing accuracy, and meeting stringent EU directives, while also laying the groundwork for future growth.

With a powerful combination of advanced smart metering hardware and robust software, TLS is well-positioned to drive customer-driven innovations and expand its offerings. Working with Davra has enabled TLS to solidify its status as a leader in sustainable metering solutions, ensuring long-term success and continued market leadership.

Discover how Davra can help your business strengthen its innovation leadership status by speaking to one of our experts (opens new window) today.