I think Echelon (ELON) is a stock to watch this morning.  We’ve seen other demand response/smart grid players (with the exception of Itron) such as EnerNoc (ENOC) and Comverge (COMV) take off like a rocket and now it may be Echelon’s turn.  The company beat estimates last night by .06/share, posting a narrower loss of .23/share.  Revenues also came in better than expected at $22.60 mill vs the $21.8 analyst expected.  Guidance is a bit mixed.  The company sees a loss of .15 – 17 vs the Wall St estimate of .20 on the EPS side but is shy of Wall St estimates with $23 million in revenue.

“Echelon executed well in what remains a very challenging economic environment for us and our customers,” said Ken Oshman, chairman and CEO of Echelon. “Our focus on carefully managing costs while maintaining investment in important long-term initiatives for growth is reflected in our results. Our smart grid projects in Denmark proceeded as planned in the quarter and we see increased interest and activity around the world in energy saving and energy management applications enabled by Echelon’s products – from advanced metering to smart street lighting systems, commercial demand response to in-home energy management. While the near-term environment remains difficult, we remain confident in the long-term prospects for our products. We believe we are positioned at the sweet spot of the industry,” concluded Oshman.