News Article

Itron Inc. announced Wednesday (March 29) that it will sponsor a $10,000 first-place scholarship award for the 2006 Gonzaga University Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program Business Plan Competition. The competition is held in collaboration with Eastern Washington University’s Center for Entrepreneurial Activities and Whitworth College’s School of Global Commerce and Management.

The first-place prize in the Student-Generated category will be named the “Itron Knowledge to Shape Your Future Award” and will be provided to the team that presents the top business plan built around an original student idea. Itron’s gift is the largest contribution by a Spokane-based company in the six-year history of the competition.

“This generous contribution from Itron signals the value that community leaders place on entrepreneurship, education and experience in our institutions of higher education,” said Paul F. Buller, director of the Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program. “The Student-Generated category is the centerpiece of the Business Plan Competition — more than 50 out of 80 teams from Gonzaga, EWU, Whitworth and Washington State University are competing in that category this year.

“The Itron Knowledge to Shape Your Future Award is aptly named. It will stimulate entrepreneurship, education, innovative thinking and entrepreneurial action among college students in the Inland Northwest region.”

This year’s competition is the largest yet, with more than 80 teams of graduate and undergraduate students competing for a total of $42,500 in prize money, awarded to finalist teams in three categories:

Student-Generated, for original student ideas; Community-Based, for students working on for-profit ideas originating from entrepreneurs in the community; and Social Enterprises, for students working on non-profit ideas.

The competition aims to create a valuable learning opportunity for students and to provide an incentive for the creation of new commercial and social enterprises in the region. All team members in the Student-Generated category must be enrolled students and their business must be based on an original student idea.

“As a company with knowledge to shape futures, we are proud to help stimulate ideas and innovation in business development for students studying in the Inland Northwest,” said Kim Pearman-Gillman, Itron’s vice president of corporate marketing. “Our company looks to make a positive difference in the world, and I can’t think of a better way to ensure that difference than by investing in students, our future leaders.”

To learn more about the Business Plan Competition, visit the Gonzaga Web site at www.gonzaga.edu/entrepreneur.

Itron ( www.itron.com | NASDAQ: ITRI) is a leading technology provider and critical source of knowledge to the global energy and water industries. Nearly 3,000 utilities worldwide rely on Itron’s award-winning technology to provide the knowledge they require to optimize the delivery and use of energy and water. Itron creates value for its clients by providing industry-leading solutions for electricity metering; meter data collection; energy information management; demand response; load forecasting, analysis and consulting services; distribution system design and optimization; web-based workforce automation; and enterprise and residential energy management. To know more, start here:

For additional information, contact Mima Scarpelli at Itron at (509) 891-3565 or via e-mail at mima.scarpelli@itron.com