FLUX is a high-end, TED-like event with a regional-international scope, engaging business, government and institutional leaders alike. It is focused on shaping our future through the crucially important, yet often neglected domain of utilities. It is about the transformative potential utilities hold and the momentous challenges they cannot ignore any more – about harmonizing the heritage of the past with smart, viable and innovative ways forward.
Public utilities are rarely in focus these days. We usually take their existence and availability for granted. This, however, has not always been the case. Public utility services have played a key role in the astonishing economic development of the past century and have underpinned the spectacular improvement of our quality of life. Sprawling utility infrastructures have become the “nervous systems” of our present-day societies, and their importance in the 21st century will continue to grow as more and more people move to cities.
What’s more, the digital revolution brings an evolutionary pressure on the utilities sector: renewables, distributed generation, e-mobility, the cognification of our homes, cities and the grid require new capabilities and drive the need for new business models and regulatory frameworks. The continuous flow of data requires special attention and new responsibilities while creating valuable opportunities at the same time. Due to our rising energy needs, mobility demands and the interconnectedness of our systems, we have transitioned to a new level of complexity.
The combined effects of all these are fundamentally affecting the future and sustainability of public utilities. How will our already overcrowded and often outdated critical infrastructure systems face the accelerating challenges and exponential changes posed by sustainability, reliability, resilience and digitization?
All in all – what does the future hold for the utilities industry? Our aim is to answer this question.
We are organizing a one-day, invitation only think-tank event for those utilities industry executives, who not only want to learn what the future holds, but have the courage to shape it. Our aim is to provide a platform for this. We plan to foster conversation, connections, and even new initiatives and alliances with the help of mind-shifting talks and workshops on the following topics:
We are witnessing the rapid transformation and restructuring of the energy sector in Hungary – developments in nuclear, renewable and alternative energy sources bring to life valuable opportunities as well as new challenges.
The Hungarian Government is committed to providing affordable, sustainable and transparent utility services, even next to growing quality standards, and channels all efforts towards raising the life standards of our nationals. NKM National Utilities Ltd. have devised a unique symposium organised for local and regional stakeholders and opinion leaders of the infrastructure and utilities sector, where joint thinking and the exploration of groundbreaking innovative solutions speed up knowledge transfer and the divulgation of good practice.
It is a great pleasure of mine to be Patron of this extraordinary initiative. I wish all participants insightful and fruitful discussions and conference.
government commissioner for postal affairs and national financial services
The aim of the workshop is to analyze the processes and dynamic interactions between trends – either economical, societal or technological – and consumer behaviour. We will not only look behind the processes but explore the predictability of these phenomena; what the shifts we detect in the process imply; and as a result of this, what type of considerations are triggered in those involved. By analysing these reciprocal processes, we can relate them to regional and global milestones, and explore the topic in such depth that enables us to calibrate the reactions of the service provider to the newly emerging consumer needs.
The most important question that we seek to answer: What should be done - how and why - to reach and engage the new customer?
The event is invitation only – tickets are not available for sale.
However, if you feel your attendance is crucial, please contact the organizers.
NKM National Utilities Ltd. (“National Utilities” or the “Company”) had been established as the national utility service provider to contribute, by defending national interests, to the Hungarian Government’s utility cost reduction program in a long term and to maintain utility fees at a reasonable level for Hungarian consumers.
The main task of National Utilities is to ensure and control a consistent and centralised national system of public utilities and to establish and maintain a sustainable operation of the public utilities such as natural gas, electricity and district heating. The Company’s further aims are driven by its corporate responsibility, e.g. increasing security in domestic supply and to provide customer service more simple, faster and accessible.
The fundamental basis of the national public utility service model is to carry out activities on the basis of comprehensive community criteria and in line with the Hungarian Government’s social policy. The system can simultaneously represent and enforce the market based activity and a non-profit principle, as income realised from activities would be recontributed into the system to enhance services by making consumers’ interest a top priority.
National Utilities provides unified management for such national utility system. Licensed activities, such as gas trading or gas distribution are performed by state owned companies where control is carried out by the Company. National Utilities is not a public utility service provider and has no direct contact with consumers, but operates as a holding centre, exercising management-rights over the companies participating in the national utility system.
In 2015 and 2016 National Utilities has been building the gas pillar of the national utility system by gaining control over NKM Földgázszolgáltató Ltd. (the former FŐGÁZ Ltd.) and GDF Suez retail gas company, GSEM Ltd. and took over more than 1,8 consumers from E.ON Energy Services Ltd. and Tigáz Ltd., resulting 3,4 million natural gas consumers in Hungary serviced by the national utility service provider.
At the end of 2016, National Utilities started to build the second pillar of the system by signing the contract of purchasing NKM Áramszolgáltató Ltd. (the fomer DÉMÁSZ Ltd.) and NKM Áramhálózati Ltd. from EDF International. With the purchase of NKM Áramszolgáltató Ltd. the national electricity service is available for more than 4,5 million consumers in Hungary. Since the 6th of November 2017 the electricity and natural gas companies, as well as their subsidiaries owned by NKM National Utilities Ltd. continue to operate with the unified National Utilities brand and appearance.
Budapest, Kazinczy u. 21/c, 1075
The venue unfortunately does not offer parking. We recommend you to arrive by taxi.