To address a critical market gap, leading multinational infrastructure engineering and advisory firm Zutari has partnered with Energy Exemplar, the creators of PLEXOS®, to launch an integrated market intelligence and scenario-planning solution tailored specifically for SAWEM. By combining Zutari’s extensive on-the-ground South African energy data, regulatory context, and engineering advisory expertise with the physics-based PLEXOS® fundamental modelling engine, the collaboration delivers a trustworthy, defensible market view from day one.

As South Africa transitions from its historic single-buyer electricity model toward a competitive wholesale market structure under SAWEM, energy market participants face an unprecedented analytical challenge. With no historical price data, established benchmarks, or local wholesale trading models to rely on, market participants are confronting significant commercial and operational uncertainty.

Bridging the Analytical Gap for SAWEM

The transition to SAWEM, encompassing day-ahead, intraday, and balancing mechanisms, requires independent power producers (IPPs), energy traders, large power users, and emerging market participants to evaluate price formation, dispatch behaviour, and portfolio risk under rapidly evolving market conditions. Traditional forecasting tools, reliant on past market trends, are insufficient for a system undergoing fundamental structural reform.

Through this partnership, market participants gain introductory access to PLEXOS® Pulse, an accessible, out-of-the-box cloud-based market intelligence service that provides ready-to-use, fundamentals-based forecasts and scenario modelling relative to South Africa’s electricity market, requiring no internal modelling teams or complex software setup. It helps teams understand market movement, explains market drivers, and share market-ready intelligence across trading, planning, and commercial workflows.

“As South Africa enters a new era of competitive power trading, market participants cannot afford to rely on guesswork or static historical models,” says Janice Foster, Managing Director: Energy at Zutari. “By pairing Zutari’s deep understanding of local grid dynamics and regulatory frameworks with PLEXOS®’s globally proven modelling engine, we are providing the market with a transparent, evidence-based reference point. Our goal is to empower generators, traders, and large energy users to make confident, defensible investment and operational decisions as SAWEM unfolds.”

"PLEXOS® is trusted by energy leaders across the globe," says David Robertson, SVP, EMEA at Energy Exemplar. "When markets change, PLEXOS® helps organisations understand what's coming and why. Pairing its modelling capabilities with Zutari's on-the-ground experience and analysis means SAWEM participants get a solution that's both globally proven and genuinely local."

Empowering Decision-Makers Across the Energy Value Chain

The joint offering brings immediate time-to-value across multiple organisational roles and business models:

• Energy Traders & IPPs: Accelerate the transition from market shifts to executable trading strategies using updated forecasts and physics-grounded dispatch modelling.
• Portfolio & Risk Managers: Bring explainable, auditable market scenarios to risk committees, investors, and regulatory bodies.
• Large Energy Users: Evaluate long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs), procurement options, and cost exposure before market shifts impact financial budgets.
• Analysts & Planners: Utilise plain-language AI Querying capabilities to extract insights, generate charts, and build executive dashboards in minutes.

By establishing a comprehensive analytics reference for SAWEM, Zutari and PLEXOS® are building the foundation for a transparent, efficient, and resilient South African energy ecosystem.