Behind the Screens at Eneve
Before joining Eneve, Antonia Humphreys spent a decade on the supplier side, wrestling with the same market complexity our customers face today. Now, as part of Eneve's product team, she helps shape the trading and pricing capabilities inside our wider solution suite; making sure what started life as Jules continues to evolve in lockstep with the needs of traders, pricing teams and operations.
Antonia didn't arrive at Eneve as a software specialist, but as a power market practitioner who depended on our trading and pricing solution every day. She started her career at a leading energy supplier, working across what she calls the "supply hub": metering, agents, settlements and eventually pricing.
"Part of my role was to manage the clients using what's now our trading and pricing solution, so I was very familiar with it as a customer. I also got to know the team quite well through day to day activities and corporate events."
After ten years with that supplier, a role opened up at the company behind the solution she relied on. "I'd been with the supplier for 10 years, so I think I'd earned the change of scenery," she smiles. "And the rest is history. Nine years later, I'm still here, working on the same product, but from a totally different perspective."
Her "grown up jobs", as she calls them, have all been in the energy industry. She once imagined a career in history, but quickly discovered that the energy world offered more opportunity, and never left. "It's scary to say nearly 20 years in the energy industry," she jokes. "It's a long time."
That long experience is exactly what shapes how Antonia looks at product decisions today. Because she once sat on the supplier side, she still thinks first in terms of user realities, not feature lists.
As a former customer, she was constantly feeding ideas into the solution's evolution. "We got the usual feedback from end users: it's easy to use, it's very autonomous, customers can do what they wish within the parameters set by the supplier," she says. "But as a supplier user, it was really good working with the team to build on the solution I was working on. A lot of the functionality or tweaks were actually my own requests, and it's really nice to see that ten years later, people are still using those things."
Today, within Eneve's product organisation, she brings that same mindset to a wider group of customers and colleagues. Eneve's trading and pricing capabilities are designed by people who know what it's like to be on the other end of the screen.
"Compared to a lot of IT providers, the product team here has a lot of energy background. We've been on the supplier side, as consultants, or just exposed to the markets for a long time. So when a customer comes and says 'this is our problem', we can say 'here is a solution', they don't have to tell us exactly how to build it."
For her, that is still "quite unique" in the market: a provider that understands both the market, and the small everyday nuances in how users work.
At the core of Eneve's portfolio are trading and pricing capabilities that help suppliers act quickly and confidently across different markets and contract types. What began as a standalone solution (previously named Jules) now sits as a key component within Eneve's broader software suite, connecting trading, risk, billing and operations.
"Each customer has different layers or nuances that make their setup slightly different," Antonia says. "I wouldn't change that at all. You can add things on or do things in a slightly different way, but the core, how we support trading across various markets. is what these capabilities are all about."
Around that core, Eneve provides what she calls "the icing on the cake": reporting, analytics and additional modules that support communication and insight across suppliers and their customers. These are the elements that help end customers manage their energy assets on time and within budget, while giving suppliers the transparency they need on exposure and position.
"The granularity and visibility the solution gives helps customers mitigate risk and exposure," she explains. "In turn, it helps the energy supplier with their own forecasts and position in the market, and it makes sure the bill that lands on the doormat is not totally out of whack with what they're expecting."
One project in particular stays with her. A customer had faced a significant negative financial impact and needed to change course. Working together, Antonia and the team designed and implemented new functionality now used across hundreds of meter points.
"The feedback from the customer has always been really good, and we've added to it over time," she says. "It's been quite an impactful bit of kit; simple in premise, but with a big technical aspect and a big financial benefit. It really resolved an issue they had, for them and for their end customers."
What Antonia enjoys most is watching ideas become something real that customers use every day.
Product development gives me the most energy. Seeing how the energy market changes, coming up with new ideas and features, designing them from a functional perspective, working with our tech team to bring them to life; something that starts as a few comments on a piece of paper becomes documented, implemented, delivered and used. That's my favourite thing to see.
A core principle is that customers come to Eneve with problems, not pre-packaged solutions. "They might say 'we can't offer a certain type of contract' or 'we need to mitigate a particular risk'," she explains. "We come back with a solution, talk that through, and adapt it to their specific nuances and way of working."
Sometimes the changes are small but meaningful; adjusting report frequencies, parameters or trading windows to better match how teams operate or to help mitigate risk. Other times they're bigger, more complex projects that may seem "wild" at first, but are broken down into practical steps.
"It all comes down to relationship management," she emphasises. "Thankfully, our customers trust us enough to come to us with a problem and take our solution."
That trust is mirrored in how deeply embedded the solution is in users' routines. "Over the years, we've seen that end users don't tend to leave," she notes. "They might change supplier, but the way of working we support is ingrained in their day to day."
If these trading capabilities were a book, Antonia says, we'd be in "volume two."
"You could argue that in the energy industry every week is a new chapter," she laughs. "But if you count the acquisition of Jules into Eneve, volume one was as a standalone product. Volume two is our wider impact as part of Eneve."
That shift is about multiplying impact instead of losing identity. "Instead of being that lone soldier, we've got other soldiers next to us."
In practice, that means bringing trading capabilities into other Eneve solutions, and letting those solutions support trading in return. "We're really looking at where this sits in the whole end to end solution catalogue," she explains. "How we can grow it as part of Eneve, and how it can help our other products as well."
For all the complexity of markets, systems and features, what Antonia is proudest of is the people she works with every day.
"I would say having such a good team to work in," she says. "Everyone from sales and customer facing roles to ops and developers. Everybody is really involved and really aware of what the product is and how it's delivered."
The core product team is small, which creates a strong sense of mutual reliance. "There's a lot more reliance on each other, and I think we're a really good, dynamic, energetic team," she says. "I'm really proud of how quickly we turn things around, how supportive we are of each other, and that we genuinely have a good time when we're together."
Outside of work, Antonia underlines something equally important: Eneve's approach to work-life balance.
"I don't have days where I think 'I don't want to go to work'," she says. "After almost 10 years, that's really important. It can be stressful and long at times, but I still enjoy it."
As a parent, she appreciates being able to blend responsibility with flexibility. "Being able to do the school runs, and in general, balance my family life with professional life, is a really good part of working at Eneve."
"If you're happy at work, you're happy at home and vice versa," she adds. "For some people I know, that balance just isn't there. For us, it is, and that makes a difference."
Behind the Screens at Eneve spotlights the people and decisions shaping Eneve's software suite. Want to learn more about our solutions? Get in touch.