Vantage Towers, one of Europe's leading tower companies, and Gridle, Elisa Industriq's energy optimization business, have agreed on a collaboration to strengthen the resilience, value and sustainability of Vantage Towers' telecom infrastructure in Spain. The initiative aims to lay the foundation for a virtual power plant on Vantage Towers' infrastructure and begins with an initial deployment at selected radio base station sites where AI-powered Gridle will optimize the company's battery systems. 

"In moments when storms, power cuts and hybrid threats challenge the resilience of communications networks, it becomes our duty as an industry to explore all avenues that can help strengthen continuity of service. Through this collaboration, we contribute technologies that support operators in keeping networks running not only for hours, but for days when circumstances demand it," said Nicolas Mahler, Interim CEO and CFO, Vantage Towers.

Gridle was originally developed to optimize Elisa's own extensive fleet of batteries across Finland and Estonia. Today, leading telecom companies, including DNA Towers Finland (part of Telenor Group), use the service to optimize charging, reduce emissions and participate more efficiently in energy markets. Gridle charges batteries during low cost, low emission periods, discharges them during price peaks, and trades available capacity in balancing and wholesale electricity markets. This intelligent optimization reduces energy costs and carbon emissions, contributes to the communications and energy networks' resilience, and unlocks new revenue opportunities.

"Batteries are essential in protecting nationally critical telecom infrastructure. The blackout in Spain and Portugal last year reminded us how quickly society is disrupted when networks go down. We are pleased to collaborate with Vantage Towers to demonstrate how battery investments can turn resilience into operational excellence and financial gains when managed with intelligent systems like Gridle," said Jukka-Pekka Salmenkaita, Managing Director of Gridle and VP of AI at Elisa.

Vantage Towers Spain becomes the southernmost deployment of Gridle to date. Across Northern Europe, Gridle optimizes a wide range of assets-from telecom batteries to industrial, residential and grid scale energy storage systems. This collaboration marks an important step in extending these capabilities across Europe.

More information & interview requests:

Elisa Industriq Mediadesk, [email protected], tel. +358 50 305 1605

Vantage Towers, [email protected]

About Gridle

Gridle is an AI-powered energy flexibility service that maximizes the value of flexible energy assets such as batteries, e-boilers and thermal storage systems. Gridle turns energy flexibility, the ability to shift when electricity is produced or consumed, into financial value. Gridle controls energy assets intelligently and decides when energy assets should use, store or produce energy. It then offers this flexibility capacity to electricity markets that balance supply and demand, enabling customers to cut energy costs and gain new revenue streams. The service is vendor-neutral and ensures the security of mission-critical assets and infrastructure. Drawing on Elisa's 140+ years of innovation and automation and its expertise in operating nationally critical infrastructure, Gridle delivers dependable energy services that translates directly into operational efficiency and measurable financial outcomes. elisaindustriq.com/gridle

About Elisa Industriq

Elisa Industriq creates software solutions for operational intelligence by multiplying industrial knowledge with AI innovation. Our businesses - camLine, sedApta, Polystar, CalcuQuote, TenForce, and Gridle - serve over 2,500 clients internationally in the manufacturing, telecommunications, and energy sectors. 

Elisa Industriq delivers business value for customers by reducing costs, improving quality, and generating growth. Our software solutions integrate with customers' existing systems to optimize their operations in areas including manufacturing execution, supply chain optimization, network analytics, and energy management. 

Elisa Industriq is part of Elisa, a pioneer in telecommunications and digital services headquartered in Finland. Our shared mission is a sustainable future through digitalization. Elisa Industriq employs over 1,500 experts in Europe, Asia, and North America. elisaindustriq.com

About Vantage Towers

Vantage Towers is a leading tower company in Europe with about 88,000 sites in ten countries, connecting people, businesses and devices in cities and rural areas. The company was founded in 2020 and is headquartered in Düsseldorf.

Vantage Towers' portfolio includes towers, masts, rooftop sites, distributed antenna systems (DAS) and small cells. By building, operating and leasing this infrastructure to MNOs or other network providers such as IoT companies or utilities, Vantage Towers is making a significant contribution to a better-connected Europe.

While already 100% of the grid electricity that Vantage Towers uses to operate its infrastructure is obtained from renewable energy sources, green energy generation is piloted directly on site with the help of solar panels and micro wind turbines, and also hydrogen solutions are under testing. This fits well into the overall strategy of the company to drive a sustainable digitalisation in Europe and to support partners through technological innovation in decarbonisation and achieving their climate goals.

For more information, please visit our website at http://www.vantagetowers.com or connect with us on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/company/vantagetowers.