Just when it looks like the world is simply going to fall apart, something good happens to make your day. The last two months have been about as bleak as it gets, so today’s surprise news announcement out of NIHK was a welcome diversion from the mess that is our markets.

Today, just before the market opened, NIHK’s CEO Doug Saathoff announced behemoth Itron (NASDAQ: ITRI), the single largest meter provider for utilities in the US, has agreed to include the NIHK remote disconnect technology as part of their product offerings.

This is really major, market moving news. I love it. Long term followers of NIHK will recall the company has been in an arrangement with Verizon in the past that kind of fizzled.

However, I don’t think this arrangement will fizzle the same way. NIHK has been selling it remote disconnect power units to the utility industry for year. The Verizon use was a different application using the same technology.

Itron should be different. Itron is already in the business of enhancing the technology associated with meter reading. They are the 1200 lb guerilla in the business of remote meter reading. They own almost 50% of the market for remote meter reading- they can read the meters and figure out your bill remotely- they just can’t turn the meter off remotely. By adding the NIHK solution, now they can.
I hate to point this out, but as we move deeper into this ugly recession, utilities are going to want to lower costs by investing in remote meter reading, and are going to need to shut the power down in a lot more buildings.

This is probably going to lead to a substantial increase in sales in the remote disconnect business for NIHK.

The market is getting it right- the stock is responding in kind today. Here’s the chart at 10:00 Pacfic Time.

As you can see, the stock has already returned to September levels just today, and is trying to grind it’s way through $.04 on its way to $.05. This is a pretty nice development when one considers the stock was under $.02 in the last month.

NIHK demonstrates what can happen in microcaps when they are this blown out. They can trade up pretty nicely on light volume as there are simply fewer shares for sale.

This is really welcome news, and it’s nice to see the stock getting some legs.

Now, I’m even more interested in looking at the company 10Q filing. I hope I see enough positive stuff on the both the income statement and the balance sheet to become really optimistic.

In case you’re wondering, ITRI delivered nearly $1/2 billion in revs last quarter, and today’s news appears as an ITRI release as well.

If this gels into something substantial, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the stock back at $.10 in 2009.
Comments and questions are welcome.