News Release

Software Company Releases Energy Benchmarking Tool
TeleBright Corp. Packages Benchmarking and Trend Analysis in a New Energy Management Software Program

October 13, 2008, Written by Andrew C. Burr

The cost of energy is altering the way businesses are being operated, and in some cases, opening entirely new doors.

TeleBright Software Corp., a Rockville, MD-based technology firm that helps companies manage their telecom expenses, has jumped into the energy efficiency sector with a new program that benchmarks energy use in commercial buildings.

"Building owners know what they’re spending on energy. They get their reports every month, they see the line items. What they don’t know is how efficient their building is," said Chet Thaker, CEO of TeleBright. "Benchmarking is the real needle you need to move."

The energy software, a modified version of TeleBright’s flagship telecom management program, generates detailed analytical reports on electricity, water and gas usage, including historical data. It even converts energy use to greenhouse gas emissions. And thanks to a partnership with the government’s Energy Star program, the reports also include a monthly Energy Star score, allowing stakeholders to gauge exactly how energy efficient their buildings are.

Buildings with scores of 75 or higher are eligible to receive the Energy Star label, a designation of the nation’s most energy efficiency structures. About 4,000 commercial buildings have earned the label so far, while about 8 billion square feet of commercial space has been benchmarked through the program.

But TeleBright’s software is more than just a fancy way to receive an Energy Star score, which building professionals can already generate online for free.

The program’s chief benefit is in the collection, organization and analysis of energy data, which is particularly useful across a portfolio of buildings that may house a variety of operations, or use different energy providers. The software allows customers to line-up buildings and compare things like peak energy consumption, utility rates and total energy costs, helping them identify consumption trends and locate expenses that can be reduced by applying energy efficiency strategies.

The program can also read submeters, which TeleBright provides at an additional cost. By feeding submeter readings into the program, a commercial tenant could monitor the energy use of its space, or measure the consumption of something as specific as a data center or single server within that space.

TeleBright said it has no intention of expanding into energy consulting, where energy service companies (known as ESCOs), commercial real estate services firms and a rapidly emerging sector of independent consulting groups are all battling for business. In fact, Thaker indicated that customers may appreciate the fact that the firm isn’t pitching its own follow-up services.

"We have no bias. We’re not on anybody’s side except the customer," Thaker said.

TeleBright is marketing its software to building owners and tenants, but its main targets are property management firms that handle big portfolios of buildings, and building systems manufacturers that Thaker says could potentially package TeleBright’s software with its own products, as an added service for consumers.

Eventually, Thaker would like to take the software directly to utilities, which he says could use the product to streamline invoicing. In other words, instead of receiving separate bills for water, electricity and gas, businesses could see all of their utility expenses in one place, and at the time same, have energy baselines and trends at their fingertips. "We would love to be that platform for the utility," Thaker said.

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About TeleBright Software Corporation:

Developing software solutions since 1988, TeleBright offers an integrated cost and resource savings system for telecom, and utilities with efficiency benchmarking and monitoring. The ManageRight product solution introduces proactive notifications to users for managing the entire enterprise. This transparent and flexible technology can save thousands for businesses and the government. TeleBright is based in Rockville, Maryland.