Kraken Wins a Global Recognition Award 2026
When Greg Jackson founded Octopus Energy in 2016, his motivation was personal: watching his own energy bills jump unpredictably and deciding the industry’s opacity was a technology failure, not an inevitable reality. That conviction produced Kraken — the world’s only proven, end-to-end AI operating system for energy utilities. Octopus became Kraken’s first customer in 2016, with 45,000 accounts. Today, Octopus has 9 million UK customers — the UK’s largest energy supplier, the first to displace British Gas since the 1990s — with a 4.8/5 Trustpilot rating across 7 countries. Furthermore, Kraken is licensed to EDF, E.ON Next, National Grid (US), Origin, and Tokyo Gas — contracted to serve 70 million accounts globally, generating $500M+ in annual revenue. Additionally, in December 2025, Kraken was spun out at an $8.65 billion valuation following a $1 billion funding round led by Stripe and OpenAI. For that platform and that mission, Octopus Energy and Kraken have earned a 2026 Global Recognition Award.
Technical Innovation and Architecture
Kraken processes 15 billion data points daily — from smart meters, EVs, heat pumps, home batteries, and grid-scale wind and storage assets. Furthermore, the world’s largest residential VPP connects 500,000+ devices representing 2 GW of flexible capacity — automatically scheduling EV charging and home heating at low-carbon, low-cost times, saving consumers $200M+ annually. Additionally, AI drafts 40%+ of Octopus’s customer communications, and the platform has enabled a 30-fold increase in new product launches for partner utilities. Consequently, Kraken is not a billing system. It is the AI infrastructure layer of the energy transition.
70 Million Accounts, National Grid, and OpenAI
National Grid became the first large-scale US utility to adopt Kraken in May 2025 — opening the world’s largest energy market at the moment. In July 2025, Kraken reached $500M in contracted annual revenue and 2 GW of US grid flexibility regulation demand, which only Kraken can provide. Furthermore, July 2025 saw Kraken reach $500M contracted annual revenue and 2 GW VPP capacity. Additionally, the December 2025 $1B spinout round brought in D1 Capital, Fidelity, Ontario Teachers’, Stripe, and OpenAI simultaneously — the most consequential investor syndicate in energy technology history. Consequently, the intersection of the world’s leading AI company and the world’s most proven utility operating system signals a frontier AI integration roadmap no competitor can replicate.
Greg Jackson CBE — From Energy Bill Frustration to the UK’s Largest Supplier
Greg Jackson’s founding motivation was personal: the volatility of his own energy bill led him to a conviction that clean energy must be made cheaper for everyone through technology — not rhetoric. Furthermore, as a serial technology entrepreneur who had built and sold multiple companies before Octopus, he had the product conviction to build Kraken as a platform, not just a retail business. Additionally, Time 100 Climate Leader recognition, a CBE, UK Cabinet Office board membership, and Honorary Fellowship at Pembroke College, Cambridge represent the most comprehensive recognition of any clean energy entrepreneur in British history. Consequently, his December 2025 statement — “Kraken is in a class of its own” — is not promotional. It is a decade of evidence compressed into a single sentence.
The Spinout and IPO Trajectory
The December 2025 demerger separates Kraken’s neutral utility platform business from Octopus’s consumer retail and clean tech operations — enabling Kraken to serve EDF and E.ON without competitive conflict while Octopus deploys $1.2B in fresh capital. Furthermore, Amir Orad, as Kraken CEO, and Tim Wan, as CFO (ex-Asana CFO), provide the enterprise software and capital markets leadership that a potential mid-2026 IPO requires. Additionally, Greg Jackson’s public challenge to the London Stock Exchange to “hustle harder” signals genuine ambiguity about the listing venue — and the leverage of a UK-founded company that could choose either London or New York.
Industry Impact and Future Vision
The energy transition needs more than renewable generation — it needs a smarter grid that can balance millions of distributed assets in real time. Furthermore, Kraken is the only platform proven to deliver this at utility-scale: 40 GW of power managed, 2 GW of flexible residential capacity orchestrated, and 70 million accounts served. Additionally, the C&I expansion, US market entry, and OpenAI investment signal three simultaneous acceleration vectors that compound Kraken’s already insurmountable data and deployment advantage. Most importantly, Kraken is building the operating system that will enable the world’s energy utilities to manage the decarbonized, electrified, AI-optimized grid of the 21st century. Octopus Energy and Kraken earn the 2026 Global Recognition Award for building the AI platform that is making the energy transition possible — for utilities, consumers, and the climate.
15 billion data points processed daily: the deepest AI training data flywheel in energy technology — every new account compounds forecasting, optimization, and automation accuracy permanently ahead of any competing platform
World’s largest residential VPP: 500,000+ connected devices, 2 GW flexible capacity — EVs, heat pumps, home batteries, solar panels automatically scheduled at low-cost, low-carbon times
40 GW power assets managed: from offshore wind to grid-scale batteries — Kraken manages the full power asset stack at the utility operating-system level, not just residential meters
AI drafts 40%+ of customer communications: machine learning applied to customer service at scale — reducing handling costs while improving response quality and customer satisfaction simultaneously
30x new product development increase: partner utilities launch new products 30 times faster on Kraken than on legacy systems — platform modularity eliminating the engineering bottleneck to energy innovation
700 MW grid flexibility sold: Intelligent Octopus Go processes 100M+ daily smart meter readings, enabling Octopus to sell 700 MW of residential flexibility through the UK’s national grid balancing mechanism
70 million accounts contracted globally: EDF Energy, E.ON Next, National Grid (US), Origin (Australia), Tokyo Gas, MAINGAU, Good Energy — world’s most commercially significant utilities on one platform
$500M+ contracted annual revenue, 4x in 3 years: revenue trajectory confirming mainstream utility infrastructure procurement — not innovation-budget pilots, operational IT investment
Octopus: UK’s #1 supplier, 4.8/5 Trustpilot in 7 countries: first company to displace British Gas since 1990s market liberalization — the permanent live proof point of Kraken’s operational excellence
Bulb migration: 1.5 million customers migrated in 6 months — a migration that traditional utility IT would take years to complete; validated Kraken’s rapid onboarding architecture at production scale
$8.65 billion spinout valuation (December 2025): UK’s most valuable enterprise software spinout in energy history — valued higher than most publicly listed European energy software companies
$200M+ saved annually for consumers: VPP smart scheduling saves households real money on energy bills while simultaneously providing grid decarbonization services
D1 Capital + Fidelity + Ontario Teachers’ + Stripe + OpenAI investor syndicate: most consequential utility technology investor group ever assembled — AI, fintech, institutional pension capital, and hedge fund conviction simultaneously
National Grid US adoption (May 2025): first large-scale US utility on Kraken — beachhead into world’s largest energy market at the moment, IRA and state grid flexibility regulations demand platform-level digital transformation
Potential IPO mid-2026: Tim Wan (ex-Asana CFO) appointed; Greg Jackson publicly challenging LSE to compete for listing — would be Europe’s defining clean energy technology public market event
OpenAI investment signals LLM integration roadmap: world’s leading AI company investing in an energy utility OS signals near-term integration of large language models into grid optimization and customer intelligence
C&I expansion launched July 2025: Kraken moves from residential to commercial and industrial — adding the largest segment of global energy consumption to its addressable market
Origin Energy equity stake in Kraken: Australia’s largest energy retailer, simultaneously a licensing customer and equity holder — the deepest possible commercial alignment between utility partner and platform
- 4.8/5 Trustpilot across 7 countries: industry’s highest customer satisfaction score — demonstrating that AI-powered utility operations produce measurably better consumer outcomes than legacy incumbents
Intelligent Octopus Go 24% MoM growth: fastest-growing smart tariff product in UK energy history — consumer demand for AI-optimized energy pricing growing faster than any traditional tariff product
Automated EV and heat pump scheduling: consumers save money without behavior change — Kraken’s VPP operates invisibly in the background, shifting load automatically at optimal times
Single platform across 32 countries: utilities expanding internationally deploy Kraken once — no new system per market, eliminating the platform fragmentation that makes incumbent utilities’ international expansion prohibitively expensive
Rapid customer onboarding architecture: Bulb’s 1.5M customers onboarded in 6 months proved what Kraken’s architecture can do — utilities can grow by acquisition without the integration cost that traditionally makes acquisitions value-destructive
Consumer-facing smart tariff product ecosystem: Intelligent Octopus Go, E.ON Next ResidentialFlex, and more — Kraken enables any utility partner to offer dynamic tariff products that were previously exclusive to industrial energy customers
Greg Jackson CBE, founding mission: make clean energy cheaper for everyone — including the households who cannot afford premium green tariffs; technology as the equity tool of the energy transition
2 GW residential flexible capacity: directly reducing dependence on fossil fuel peaking plants — every kWh of demand shifted by Kraken’s VPP is a kWh that a gas peaker plant does not need to generate
Time 100 Climate Leader recognition for Greg Jackson: the most prestigious climate leadership acknowledgment globally, confirming Octopus’s decarbonization mission as commercially validated at scale
UK Cabinet Office Non-Executive Board Member: Greg Jackson, contributing energy transition expertise directly to UK government policy formation — private sector innovation informing national energy strategy
40 GW renewable asset management: maximizing the efficiency and dispatch of offshore wind, solar, and grid-scale storage — every optimization improvement increases the carbon displacement of existing clean generation
Electroverse: Europe’s largest EV charging network, 1 million+ charging points — Octopus Energy Group expanding clean transport infrastructure beyond energy retail
