Market Overview

The South and Central America Smart Meter Market is expected to register a CAGR of over 21.1% during the forecast period 2019 – 2024. The market is primarily driven by governmental roll-outs for large-scale incorporations, in the absence of which, the primary drivers are theft prevention and reduction of other non-technical loses, along with functionality improvements, such as the ability to control utilities remotely and time-based tariffs. However, countries lacking supporting legislation are witnessing slow growth in the market, with patchy implementation of the technology. This also inhibits these systems from performing at their optimal level.

South & Central America is witnessing a rapid increase in the population migrating to urban cities. Given the rising need to reduce global energy demand by one-third by adopting energy efficient practices, a number of initiatives by the governments are helping promote energy efficiency initiatives across the region.

Deployment of smart grids and smart metering systems provides solutions to curb energy wastage in industries. Implementation of smart metering systems enables energy suppliers to continuously monitor the electricity usage, by employing smart meter systems at multiple points within the grid.

With innovations in technology, new meters with improved efficiency are expected to be employed. Consumers and governments around the world, including energy producers and suppliers, have realized the advantages of employing smart metering systems and are pushing toward their deployment.

The most prominent limitation in the smart metering market is the unavailability of capital funding. Smart systems are comparatively expensive than the regular metering equipment employed by most of service providers and users. Smart metering systems utilize digital components and connectivity systems that enable them to operate and transmit data. This increases the cost of the metering equipment.

Moreover, different smart meters are designed with various parameters, based on the operational requirements and consumer requirements, thus, driving the costs. Furthermore, smart meters are complicated equipment that requires skilled labor. All these factors drive the overall cost of these systems, making them expensive, compared to regular and conventional metering systems.

Scope of the Report

The increasing technological awareness and internet penetration in the developing countries and the growing demand in developed countries for advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) to replace existing AMR systems are expected to result in the growth of the global smart meter market. However, the saturation of the smart electricity meter market segment in major countries, with reducing yearly demand, is expected to pose a major challenge to the market, resulting in a low growth rate.

Smart electricity meters account for the largest share of the market, which is expected to witnesses declining demand throughout the forecast period. This is expected to negatively affect the overall market. It is anticipated to be revived by the large-scale roll-outs. However, smart gas and water meter segments are expected to show consistent growth during the forecast period.

Key Market Trends

Electricity is expected to register a Significant Growth

Brazil has stringent regulation policies, resulting in a consolidated market. Landis+Gyr and Elster are significant players in the country, providing high barriers for new entrants.

In Mexico, there are possibilities of significant investments that are expected to boost the yearly demand volume from the earlier 0.58 million units to 1.54 million units until 2022. The revenues of the smart meter market are not expected to follow a similar growth rate, as the growing competition is increasing the price pressure on the manufacturers.

Chile has a national rollout planned, which is expected to significantly boost the smart electricity meters market in the country. Whereas their incorporation in Ecuador is expected to be fueled by the need to reduce non-technical losses. However, the progress of the market in these countries is slow. The region at large suffers from a lack of funds, and therefore, any prospect of short-term growth of the Latin American market is absent.

Brazil to hold a Major Share

Brazil is a prominent market in Latin America, with leading utility providers like Endesa. The vast consumer base of nearly 5.7 million provides a substantial size of the potential market. The country is planning significant rollouts of smart electricity meters after positive experiences in Italy and Spain. Brazil is expected to witness significant growth in the smart gas meter market. The Brazilian government has announced funding worth around USD 200 million for developments of smart grids and also announced plans to equip smart meters in the whole country by 2021. This factor, coupled with Brazils strong importance on renewable energy generation, is expected to act as a driving factor for the Brazilian smart meter market.

Lack of regulations and funding is a vital issue, which severely restrains the market. However, water scarcity in various parts of the region is acting as a major driver for the utility department to start running trial projects, and if water scarcity continues to deteriorate further, it may accelerate smart meter deployments.

Brazil’s utility holding company AEGEA is expected to aid its subsidiary utility Nascentos do Xingu to deploy event management solutions. This technology is anticipated to be used to better understand water usage patterns for the development of tailored water efficiency initiatives. This also can be used to modernize the country’s distribution system to meet the growing demands of smart water, due to a rapid increase in its customer base.

Competitive Landscape

The South and Central America Smart Meter Market is highly competitive and consists of several major players. In terms of market share, few of the major players currently dominate the market. These major players with prominent share in the market are focusing on expanding their customer base across foreign countries. These companies are leveraging on strategic collaborative initiatives to increase their market share and increase their profitability. The companies operating in the market are also acquiring start-ups working on South and Central America Smart Meter technologies to strengthen their product capabilities.

In Sep 2017, Landis+Gyr, a global smart metering supplier with its smart grid solutions, has secured one of the largest smart metering contracts, yet awarded in India, with Tata Power Delhi Distribution Ltd. Encompassing 200,000 single-phase and three-phase smart meters, the project was a follow up to the contract for India’s first Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) with Radio Frequency (RF) Canopy, comprising 500,000 endpoints, which Tata Power-DDL awarded to Landis+Gyr earlier in the year.

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