While the company won't disclose how many customers it has signed, King says the total has doubled every month since March. He hopes to reach 50,000 by early next year. King acknowledges that customers in deregulated states have been slow to switch providers. We are moving as if competition existed right now. The real battle, however, will be for large industrial customers, says Holcombe.
Markets usually deregulate from the top down.
That makes sense, since, as DeWeese points out, energy usually ranks in the top three operating costs for commercial and industrial businesses. His plan is to match buyers and sellers in real-time auctions. On the buy side, it works primarily with energy service companies that represent corporate customers. DeWeese says his company has a half-dozen such channel partners representing thousands of customers. We have an 'Intel inside'-type of marketing model.