Executive Insights: Lenaik Andrieux of Kohler Power Systems

LENAIK ANDRIEUX, Kohler Power Systems

Lenaik Andrieux is General Manager of Kohler Power Systems, EMEA. Lenaik has over 20 years of experience in the electrical and generator set industry. He held sales management positions in the French generator set manufacturer SDMO from 1998 to 2000. He joined Caterpillar in 2001 and held Dealer interface and sales management roles for Europe, Africa, the Middle East and CIS before moving to Newbery, SC, in 2007 as the global engineering manager for diesel and gas generator sets 250kVA and below. In 2009, he became Electric Power global product definition manager, based in Griffin, Georgia. At the beginning of 2012, he returned to Geneva, Switzerland, to lead Electric Power Retail sales worldwide. In 2013, he was appointed general manager for the Electric Power Retail business, he assumed responsibilities for FG Wilson and Caterpillar marketing organizations, distribution, engineering, manufacturing, product development, customer and product support for diesel generator sets 750kVA and below. In March 2015, Lenaik was appointed general manager for the Caterpillar Electric Power Investor business (diesel generators above 750 kVA) with responsibilities for sales, marketing, engineering product support and operations. In September 2016, Lenaik became general manager of the newly formed Large Electric Power organization adding Power Rental to its existing portfolio and joining the board of Energyst, a power rental company. He served as president of Europgen, the European genset manufacturers association from 2014 to 2018. In January 2019, Lenaik joined the Kohler Power Group as the General Manager for EMEA and president of SDMO holding. In November 2019, he was appointed president of GIGREL, the French generating-set industry syndicate. Lenaik is French and holds master engineering degrees in power electronics from both Ecole Polytechnique de Nantes and Université de Nantes. He is an alumni of IMD Lausanne. In 2016 he completed Caterpillar executive Leadership program, Digging Deep.

Here’s the full text of Lenaik Andrieux’s insights from our Executive Roundtable:

Data Center Frontier: The semiconductor shortage is among the examples of how the supply chain can impact business timetables. How would you assess the state of the data center supply chain, and how it has impacted the industry?

Lenaik Andrieux: Tense is the word that comes to mind for global supply chains currently. Recent months have seen sharp increases in raw material (copper, iron…) combined with serious production capacity limitations for key industries supplying the data center market. This has included semiconductors, but more broadly and significantly the transportation industry itself. It is leading to key components shortages, increased costs, uncertainty of project execution, increased lead-times and ultimately uncertainty in the execution of data center projects. This is a tough situation in an industry that has innovation, speed of execution and volume leverage as part of its DNA.

So how did we get here, beyond the simple of fact of very significant growth in data markets? This time the supply chain tension impacts many other markets, such as the automotive industry to name an obvious one, and the world economic growth in general. Since the 2007 financial crisis, the data industry has been the fastest growing market when more traditional markets like oil and gas, mining, and infrastructure have been soft or even depressed.

These markets are generally recognized as strong profitability drivers for the manufacturing footprint. Over this last 10 to 15 years, this has led a number of key suppliers to rationalize their production and supply chain capacities. At the same time that some operations were reducing, an increased percentage of production was made available to the data center industry. Over the last 18 months, the COVID phenomena has accelerated this gap between the world’s hunger for data and more traditional industries and markets. The recovery for all has been sudden, though, leading to the current tension.

So what to do? This does not seem to be a short term situation. The first obvious answer is that increased transparency and collaboration through the supply chain is a must. Sharing project plans much earlier with all key players enables supply positions, and guarantees better planning and project execution. It also matters who you are partnering with. Financial strength is extremely relevant here. Deep expertise and focus in the data center industry seems critical, rather than choosing more generic multi-industry entities that may have to share and allocate their production capacity with all other markets. Collaboration and focus could be the winning formula.

Data Center Frontier: As sustainability takes on greater urgency, hyperscale operators are testing new approaches to power infrastructure, including integrating more renewables and innovations in backup power and fuel. What are the most likely advances ahead in data center power?

Lenaik Andrieux: This is a very important and deeply complicated topic. There are a number of technologies that can deliver centralized or distributed power, as prime or standby sources. They have their specific benefits and drawbacks on the environment. Nuclear, hydro, coal-fired, diesel, gas, solar and wind-powered power plants are commonly deployed around the planet. Energy storage technology is also now available. Hydrogen and natural gas fuel cells are emerging, and some are beginning to substitute diesel with HVO, bio-diesel or even hydrogen in recip engines.

There are a lot of choices and over the recent years we have witnessed deployment of commonly accepted sustainable solutions but not necessarily taking into account the sustainability of the whole supply chain that ultimately provides the power to the end-user. This assessment of the environmental impact of the full energy supply chain seems key to selecting the right technology.

Does it make sense to recharge energy storage devices through a coal-fired utility contract? Same question goes for how the production of hydrogen is achieved, before it is used as a fuel. Conversely, diesel generator could be seen has having a significant environmental impact when used as a prime source. Yet, when used purely as an energy insurance device, in standby mode, with “stretched” training intervals, what is their true impact? Beyond the type of “fuel” used and the energy producing technology, the understanding of the raw material content, its origin, the way it is “mined,” transported, and transformed also have to be significant elements to declare if that specific energy technology sustainable.