Greentech Lead America: Worldwide smart meter
installations will continue to grow steadily through the reminder of this
decade, reaching 960 million by 2020, Pike Research said.
Smart meter market is driven by legislative incentives in
the United States, government policy mandates in Europe, economic and system
reliability concerns in Latin America, and an aggressive deployment program in
China.
Since many aggressive utility deployments are reaching
their conclusions now, annual smart meter in some regions, including North
America, are expected to decline significantly in the next few years. However,
the number of installed smart meters worldwide will continue to climb steadily
through the remainder of this decade, reaching 960 million by 2020.
“The slowdown in smart meter rollouts in North
America, where unit shipments are expected to drop by 42 percent between 2011
and 2013, will be overshadowed by growth in Europe and Asia Pacific,
particularly China,” said senior research analyst Neil Strother.
“Growth in China is occurring much earlier and faster
than anticipated, even if debate continues on whether these meters fully meet
the definition of a smart meter,” Strother added. “Deployments in Europe will
finally begin their growth phase in the middle part of the decade, resulting in
a compound annual growth rate for the worldwide smart meter market of just
under 5 percent between 2010 and 2020.”
Meanwhile the meter vendor industry is undergoing
increasing globalization and consolidation. Many of the incumbent vendors have
globalized their businesses, via either acquisition or organic development, and
have sought expansion capital to support their efforts. The acquisition of
Landis+Gyr by Japanese industrial conglomerate Toshiba in the spring of 2011 is
the most significant among them.