Over the past six years, the energy industry has been subject to a series of far-reaching changes. It has moved from being a monopoly business, characterised by a secure market environment and reliable investment conditions, to become a liberalised energy industry focused on competitive and quality-conscious operations within the network infrastructure. Following this period of radical change, higher priority is once more being accorded to long-term structural and technical planning strategies.

As an innovative energy distribution and service provider, the MVV Energie Group bases its future planning on a target-driven, four-stage innovation process, starting with the generation of ideas and culminating in the finished product. This produces key results in the fields of product development, process optimisation and technical advances. Any successful process of innovation, however, does not only require creativity and communications competence alone - it also requires comprehensive training and sound expertise. This is why the MVV Energie Group is closely involved with national and international research projects, such as DISPOWER and SIDENA, in which new, more efficient and resource-saving technologies and products are developed, tested and promoted together with technology leaders. The research and development department has eight employees, with around 80 further company employees committing a significant share of their time (>= 5% of their working hours) to innovation projects. Our research and development expenses amounted to Euro 3.7 million in the 2003/04 financial year (previous year: Euro 3.6 million). Of this figure, Euro 1.8 million was invested in process optimisation projects and Euro 1.3 million in product development. A sum of Euro 0.6 million was dedicated to technical advances.