LONDON, Sept. 14, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Zuora, Inc., the leading enterprise platform provider for subscription order-to-cash solutions, has been selected to power Centrica Connected Home as the business aims to grow its new Hive smart home subscription services.
The smart home market reached 80 million worldwide in 2016 and is projected to broaden at a compound annual growth rate of 60 percent, reaching 477 million devices in 2020, according to information analytics firm IHS Markit.
Hive products and services, from Centrica Connected Home, address the huge market opportunity by helping people make more time for the things they love by making daily living easier.
The business unveiled its first Hive smart thermostat in 2013 and to date has installed more than 700,000 smart home hubs, including 30,000 in the U.S., and sold more than one million products. Hive uses the Zuora® Central platform to manage all of its revenue generated by its growing monthly subscriptions.
With its first subscription service, named Hive Welcome Home, the company has packaged up a selection of the company’s core product line with its most essential services to enable consumers to build a series of Hive Actions triggering lighting and electronic functions, without the need for professional installation. The Hive Welcome Home Plan costs £5.99 a month per month in the UK[1] and comes with two dimmable, smart Hive Active Light bulbs, a Hive Motion Sensor, one Hive Active Plug, and the Hive hub, which connects to a router acting as a central control unit.
“The key benefit of connected home services is that they give you the ability to live your life and enjoy experiences supported by truly intuitive technology. Products and services from the Hive brand are the next logical step in home utilities, to turn the home into an even more comfortable, secure and valued place for consumers,” said Jo Cox, Commercial Director at Centrica Connected Home.
Why Centrica Connected Home selected the Zuora platform to manage the growth of its subscription business:
- Subscriber Experience: Customers can use the Hive App, connected to Hive Hub, powered by Zuora through the platform’s back-end to easily manage their subscription services, scaling them up, down or even pausing particular features as life events change.
- Pricing Experimentation: Ahead of its launch into the US earlier this year, Centrica used the Zuora platform to roll-out multiple locally-launched pricing options and introductory offers across different territories simultaneously from the one centralized platform. Zuora provides Centrica with the agility to expand its global footprint through a hyperlocal strategy.
- Payment Support: Through Zuora’s platform, Centrica Connected Home can support 20 different payment methods and 180 currencies, while also automating collections to specific and customizable times throughout the month. This ultimately grants Centrica Connected Home the freedom to focus on scaling its customer base along with its suite of services, supporting it in tackling its aspirations for growth.
"The Subscription Economy is revolutionizing traditional industries such as energy, automotive, manufacturing, and home as the world shifts towards new digital services,” said Tien Tzuo, CEO and Founder of Zuora. “At the heart of these transformations, Zuora is orchestrating the subscription order-to-cash operations, helping companies like Centrica Connected Home to create a holistic experience for customers.”
To hear directly from Centrica Connected Home and learn more about its services read the Zuora case study and register to attend the Zuora Subscribed conference in London on September 28, 2017: https://www.zuora.com/subscribed/london-2017/
[1] Also available at different price points in America, Canada and Ireland.
Additional Resources
“The Subscription Economy: A Business Transformation” by Tien Tzuo, CEO of Zuora
SlideShare: “Drivers of Success in the Subscription Economy”
MGI Research Forecast on Agile Monetization Platforms 2016-2020
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The Hive experience and Centrica Connected Home
The Hive smart home experience is focused on making everyday life a little easier, freeing people up to spend time doing the things they love. Through a mix of software, products and services, the Hive experience is designed to offer affordable, easy to use solutions, tailored around specific use cases to help make a difference in people’s lives. The team behind the Hive brand is Centrica Connected Home, part of Centrica Consumer. Parent company Centrica plc has committed to invest £500m to take the Hive smart home experience multi-market.
About Zuora, Inc.
Zuora is a SaaS company and the world’s foremost evangelist of the Subscription Economy. Zuora’s leading enterprise platform is the only solution that automates all subscription order-to-cash operations in real-time for any business. Companies in any industry can launch new businesses, shift products to subscription, implement new pay-as-you-go pricing and packaging models, gain new insights into subscriber behavior, and disrupt market segments to gain competitive advantage. Zuora serves more than 1,000 companies around the world in a wide range of industries, including Box, Komatsu, Rogers, Schneider Electric, Toshiba, Xplornet and Zendesk. The Subscription Economy Index (SEI) demonstrates that SEI companies are growing revenues approximately nine times faster than the S&P 500. Headquartered in Silicon Valley, Zuora also operates offices in Atlanta, Boston, Denver, San Francisco, London, Paris, Beijing, Sydney, Chennai and Tokyo.
Media Contact:
Jayne Scuncio
jscuncio@zuora.com
1-408-348-1087
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