COMMUNICATIONS & NETWORKS
SMARTER SOLUTIONS FOR THE FRONT LINE
T
he UK’s utility sector is full of an array of complicated challenges. Ageing infrastructure, rising demand, climate resilience and regulatory scrutiny are often in the spotlight. At the same
time, the sector suffers skills shortages, and operational risk just continues to increase. To tackle these problems, though, billions of pounds are being committed towards strengthening the UK’s energy and water networks. As part of this, there is often a focus on digital transformation to provide some of the answer. However, investment alone here will not deliver the resilience regulators and customers expect today. And, neither will some aspects of digital transformation.
This is because many digital transformation
programmes succeed on paper and fail where it matters most: on the frontline. This failure is often not because the intent of the investment or transformation aspirations are completely wrong. It is because the tools introduced to these teams do not match up to the environments that utilities actually operate in.
Utility engineers, technicians and contractors often operate across vast estates, remote locations and hazardous environments. Many also operate alone and frequently under time pressure. In addition to this, site rules vary, risk profiles change, and work is carried out across a mixture of environments. This includes confined and safety-critical environments. Yet many digital initiatives still assume consistent access to systems and simple workflows is straight forward for these kinds of
Chris Potts, Marketing Director, ANT Telecom explains why improving frontline mobility, safety and collaboration is essential if future investments in the UK’s utility sector are to succeed
staff members to access and use. It actually is not the case, and in reality, frontline teams are often expected to navigate many fragmented platforms, paper-based processes and multiple standalone devices while delivering safer working, faster response times and improved customer outcomes. Eventually, this can result in people bypassing
processes because they have not been well- designed for frontline teams. So, digital transformation does not stall because of a lack of ambition. It stalls because systems become harder to follow than the risks they are designed to manage. So they need to be developed and streamlined for staff using them in the field on a daily basis.
The scale of infrastructure investment now planned across utilities is significant. In the energy sector, the National Preparedness Commission has warned that ageing assets and increased demand are placing the UK’s system under strain unless resilience improves. In response, Ofgem has announced £28 billion of investment across gas and electricity networks, a figure expected to rise to around £90 billion by 2031.
The water sector faces similar scrutiny. Ofwat’s 2024–25 performance report highlights ongoing challenges, with pollution referenced as a major problem. Consequently, this has resulted in the approval of £104bn upgrade; to accelerate delivery of cleaner rivers and seas and secure long-term drinking water supplies for customers. The success or failure of these investments, though, will not be found during the various procurement cycles and strategy documents that have been designed to deliver them. Instead, success or failure depends on the capabilities of frontline teams operating in complicated, high- risk environments to execute their daily work effectively, safely and efficiently.
Why mobility strategy is now a safety decision Broadly speaking, regulators increasingly highlight digitisation as a way to improve productivity, compliance and service delivery. However, digitisation only works when it functions correctly in the field. Therefore developing and executing a mobility strategy is no longer an IT consideration for the sector, it is an operational risk decision.
For instance, when mobile solutions fail to
reflect the real working conditions of staff — including lone working, hazardous tasks and the need for rapid escalation — they create issues rather than improving efficiency. Workarounds emerge, processes are bypassed and visibility is lost precisely where it is most needed. And, in high-risk environments, complexity is not neutral. It actively increases risk.
Smartphones are already the frontline workhorse
For many utility organisations there is a perception that smartphones represent the future of frontline working. In reality, smartphones are already present. They are carried by default by staff, who often bring their own devices to work, and so many people are familiar with how smartphones operate. In addition to this, many smartphones can run multiple applications; that evolve through software updates, rather than repeated hardware refresh cycles. So, when staff are provided smartphones, they are already familiar with using them.
34 PROCESS & CONTROL ENGINEERING | APRIL 2026
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