Compania de Aguas de Sabadell SA, Cassa, and Telecom Valles SA have spent about $50,000 on developing a system for reading water meters over the telephone (CI No 2,074). Sabadell-based Cassa’s head of computing services, Jaume Matutes, said that the scheme was operated by three systems at company headquarters: an IBM Corp AS/400 for general commercial management; Data General Corp Unix machines, which connect to the AS/400 and manage the meters; and another unspecified Unix machine, used to control the supply network. A Unix machine automatically makes a call to a meter, and reads the information stored there. Any variations in data since the last call was made are checked on-line. The information is then entered into Cassa’s Oracle Corp database. Each meter, Matutes said, has an impulse out-port, which sends signals to some 64 16MHz 80286 primary concentrators. The primary concentrators process and store information, received from some 40 meters. The primary concentrators are attached to secondary concentrators, which are, in turn, connected by a telephone line to the central computer at Cassa’s headquarters. Data is stored in the central system, where specialist software looks after billing. Terrassa-based Telecom Valles, which provided 50% of the cash for the project, developed and installed the meter system.
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