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Quick Take: Sales of North American metering hardware have stalled. Europe and Latin America are still not fully underway. As a result, most metering vendors are looking for ways to sell additional products and services to existing customers. Previously, they thought of themselves as meter hardware companies. Increasingly, they think of themselves as meter value companies. Today's announcement from Elster Solutions is a prime example. - Jesse Berst

Elster's Vice President of Strategy Joe Orlando refers to this new focus as "above the meter" or "beyond the meter." (Note: don't confuse this with "behind the meter," the industry term for grid-connected devices that sit inside the customer premise.)

The modular Callisto system was designed to help utilities get more value from their meter data. More specifically, to analyze events such as outages, transformer overloading, and voltage losses – and all from a single workspace.

You might think of Callisto as a dashboard or interface into which you plug different modules. Elster has created a starter set already and is partnering with others additional capabilities, including ABB, SAIC, Dominion Voltage Inc. and Milsoft.

Utilities can pull data from the Elster-branded meter data management system, of course, but also from other sources. Elster will license Callisto to utilities that want to run it themselves. For those that want a managed service, Elster has partnered with SAIC to provide that option.

Callisto is indicative of a bigger trend at Elster, according to Joe Orlando. "We are shifting resources from just the meter to providing answers for our customers," he said. Citing a roadmap that stretches to 2015, he said the company is "pulling in solutions from all over the world." For instance, revenue protection and theft capabilities originally developed in Brazil will be offered elsewhere.

Jesse Berst is the founder and chief analyst of Smart Grid News.com, the industry's oldest and largest smart grid site. A frequent keynoter at industry events in the U.S. and abroad, he also serves on advisory committees for Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the Institute for Electric Efficiency. He often provides strategic consulting to large corporations and venture-backed startups. He is a member of the advisory boards of GridGlo and Calico Energy Services.