EnBW Board of Management agrees on a reassignment of responsibilities
In view of ambitious growth targets, ever greater challenges – particularly when it comes to recruiting staff and securing the right qualifications – and the need for technological developments, the EnBW Board of Management has agreed on a reassignment of responsibilities. The Supervisory Board has given the green light for a corresponding proposal. In line with this new plan, the following changes will take effect on 1 September 2024:
The “Innovation” and “Research and Development” business areas, which had been divided between the “System Critical Infrastructure” and “Sustainable Generation Infrastructure” remits until now, will both be assigned to the Chairman of the Board of Management, Georg Stamatelopoulos, in order to take advantage of the synergy effects. Equally, the “Occupational Safety, Crisis Management and Environment” area, which currently falls under the “Sustainable Generation Infrastructure” remit, will be assigned to the Chairman of the Board of Management.
At the same time, Colette Rückert-Hennen will concentrate fully on overseeing the “Human Resources, Legal and Corporate Real Estate Management” remit and addressing the upcoming challenges in this area, while relinquishing responsibility for the “Smart Infrastructure for Customers” business segment. The growing shortage of skilled workers combined with digitalization and the new qualifications needed in this area are major challenges that will have to be overcome in the coming years against the backdrop of an unprecedented recruitment drive by EnBW. More than 9,600 new employees need to be recruited by 2026. What’s more, the EnBW Group will have to hire new staff totaling more than 50 percent of its current workforce by 2030. This is mainly necessary due to demographic change and the associated fluctuation, but also to support the company’s planned growth. By 2030, EnBW aims to invest 40 billion euros in the energy transition and in its growth.
Georg Stamatelopoulos, Chairman of EnBW’s Board of Management: “The successful recruitment of new, suitably qualified employees on this scale is crucial for enabling us to implement our projects and achieve our growth targets. It therefore requires the full commitment and undivided attention of my colleague Colette Rückert-Hennen. At the same time, we want to underline the importance of the strategically important areas of innovation, research and development, and occupational safety. We agreed on this in the boardroom following extensive discussions.”
The activities in the “Smart Infrastructure for Customers” business segment will be reassigned. Dirk Güsewell will assume responsibility for the gas and electricity end customer business along with the e-mobility business. This is in addition to his current responsibility for the “System Critical Infrastructure” remit, which covers all grid-bound business activities.
Responsibility for EnBW’s subsidiary Senec in Leipzig, which also falls under the remit of the sales department, will be temporarily taken over by Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer Thomas Kusterer. Senec currently finds itself in a restructuring phase and is developing a new product portfolio based on a new battery technology. Thomas Kusterer will closely oversee this process due to his experience in transforming companies. Senec will then be integrated into the sales department under the leadership of Dirk Güsewell.
About EnBW Energie Baden-Württemberg AG
With a workforce of over 28,000 employees, EnBW is one of the largest energy supply companies in Germany and Europe. It supplies electricity, gas and water together with infrastructure and energy-related products and services to around 5.5 million customers. In the company’s transformation from a traditional energy provider to a sustainable infrastructure group, the expansion of renewable energy sources and of the distribution and transportation grids for electricity and gas are cornerstones of EnBW’s growth strategy and the focus of its investment spending. By 2030, EnBW plans gross investments of €40 billion, around 90% of which will be in Germany. EnBW aims for renewables to account for over half of its generation portfolio by as early as the end of 2025 and to phase out coal by the end of 2028. These are key milestones on the way to the company being carbon-neutral by 2035. www.enbw.com