Piclo

Piclo, founded in 2013 by James Johnston, Andy Kilner, and Alice Tyler, is a London-based company that has developed an online marketplace for flexibility services to support the decarbonization of electrical grids. The company's primary product, Piclo Flex, enables system operators to procure, dispatch, and settle local flexibility services from providers such as electric vehicles and batteries. This marketplace helps balance the grid during times of constraint, making energy networks smarter, more flexible, and sustainable. As of 2021, Piclo Flex had facilitated 1.1GW of flexibility capacity worth over GBP 57 million, with over 55,000 assets registered representing more than 16GW of flexibility. The platform is used by major Distribution System Operators (DSOs) in the UK, including UK Power Networks, SP Energy Networks, and Electricity North West, as well as by operators in Portugal, Lithuania, and the US. In December 2022, Piclo began collaborating with National Grid to deliver a new flexibility marketplace in New York state, aiming to widen participation for distributed energy resources. In November 2023, the company announced plans to launch Piclo Max in 2024, a new market access platform designed to simplify and unlock broader electricity market access for flexibility service providers globally.

Key customers and partnerships

Piclo's platform has been adopted by several leading utilities for local flexibility services. In the UK, its customers include UK Power Networks, SP Energy Networks, and Electricity North West. Internationally, Piclo works with E-REDES in Portugal, Energijos Skirstymo Operatorius (ESO) in Lithuania, and National Grid in New York State. In December 2022, Piclo began a 12-month project with National Grid to deliver a flexibility marketplace in New York State, with the first flexibility competitions starting in early 2023. This collaboration aims to demonstrate how utilities can secure flexibility at scale and support market growth in the US.