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Powering tomorrow: The global infrastructure behind AI

We’re bringing you the latest from the world of semiconductors – straight to your ears! From quick takes on trending applications to deep dives on product innovations, our experts give you their take on the tech behind the tech.

Podcast

Oct 06, 2026

Podcast

AI may run on data, but its future depends just as much on power. In the eighth and final episode of the "We Power AI" series on Podcast4Engineers, host Kelsey Markl welcomes Andreas Weisl, CSO of the Industrial and Infrastructure Sales segment at Infineon, to look beyond the data center and explore the global race to build the power infrastructure needed for the AI era. Drawing on his experience across major transformations in lighting, automotive, and industrial markets, Andreas shares what past technology shifts can teach us about the transition ahead and why successful transformation requires much more than breakthrough technology alone. Together, they examine how different regions are responding to rapidly growing electricity demand, why aging and constrained grids are becoming a critical challenge, and how technologies such as silicon carbide, GaN, solid-state transformers, energy storage, and intelligent power systems can help create more efficient and reliable infrastructure. The discussion also looks beyond cloud AI toward the next frontier: physical AI, robotics, autonomous systems, and intelligent machines at the edge. As the "We Power AI" series comes to a close, this episode connects the dots between AI, electrification, semiconductors, and the energy systems that will power the next wave of technological transformation.

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Speakers

In this episode of the Podcast4Engineers, host Kelsey Markl speaks with Andreas Weisl, an Executive Vice President and Chief Sales Officer Industrial & Infrastructure at Infineon Technologies,

Kelsey Markl

Host:

Kelsey Markl is Head of Strategic Marketing Communications and Content at Infineon with more than a decade of experience in communications, content strategy, and storytelling. Not being an engineer is part of what makes the journey interesting. Kelsey approaches technical topics from the perspective of a curious outsider, asking the questions that help make complex ideas more accessible and relevant to engineers and broader audiences alike. Passionate about innovation and the people behind it, Kelsey enjoys exploring the trends, challenges, and breakthroughs shaping the future of engineering.

Andreas Weisl

Guest:

Muzaffer Albayrak is a Senior Manager for Application Marketing at Infineon Technologies, where he leads market strategy for Smart Drive Systems and industrial drive applications. With over 15 years of experience spanning the semiconductor, industrial, energy, and mobility sectors, he has held key business development and marketing roles at leading companies including Wolfspeed, ROHM Semiconductor, and Mitsubishi Electric. Muzaffer specializes in Go-to-Market strategies for power electronics solutions - including SiC and IGBT technologies - driving innovation in industrial automation, robotics, e-mobility, and renewable energy applications. His international experience spans Europe, China, South Korea, and India, where he has built strong technical and strategic partnerships across the global semiconductor ecosystem. He holds a degree in Mechatronics, Robotics, and Automation Engineering from FH Aachen University of Applied Sciences.

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Guest: It's not energy generation. We are going to have enough energy, at least for some time, but to get it into the grid and to manage it properly from generation to transmission to distribution to storage to conversion and all these things you need along the entire energy power infrastructure, this is where I see the main bottleneck with the AI data centers. The loads are very concentrated. They are very focused on certain locations, and that makes it somehow special. The grids as we have it today are simply not prepared for this.

 

Host: Welcome to the Podcast4Engineers. And to the 8th and final episode of our We Power AI series. Over the past episodes, we've explored the technologies, the infrastructure, and all of the semiconductor innovations making AI possible, from efficient power delivery to the data centers and to the energy systems behind today's most demanding workloads. To close our series, we're looking at the bigger picture, how power infrastructure is evolving globally to meet the demand from power-hungry applications such as data centers, and what we can learn from past technology transformations. We're also going to look at what comes next as AI moves from the cloud into the physical world. I'm very pleased to welcome Andreas Weisl, who is the CSO of the Industrial and Infrastructure Sales segment. Andreas brings a broad perspective on power semiconductors, infrastructure, and the major market shifts that's shaping our industry. Andreas, welcome to the Podcast4Engineers. It's great having you.

 

Guest: Thank you for the invitation. Happy to be here.

 

Host: So Andreas, this is actually your first time on the Podcast4Engineers, but you've been at Infineon for a while, right? Can you tell me a little bit about your journey at Infineon?

 

Guest: Yeah, sure. So I joined Infineon back in 2018 at this time the corporate account management. And then roughly 3 years later, I took over the role as a head of Automotive EMEA. And that was a very exciting time, I would say, from today's perspective, because that was for me the starting point of the automotive transformation. We already felt that this transformation is accelerating. We have already seen the first changes in the customer landscape. And that was a unique opportunity for my team and myself to shape the organization in a way to meet the new market and new customer requirements. So that means basically we looked into all the roles, we reorganized sales, technical marketing, and we introduced new marketing roles also. Then we expanded our presence in East Europe, focus Romania and Poland. We expanded our own team in Portugal, and we also discovered new channels like OEM, which was not a real sales channel before, but became very important as part of this value chain changes. Yeah, and then just at the beginning of this year, I took over the new sales segment, what we call I2 or Industrial and Infrastructure. And now it's all about strengthening the customer relationship in this industry and accelerating growth, of course, and putting a big focus also on collaboration to drive the success forward.

 

Host: And you mentioned in your intro transformation. We are in the midst of a big AI transformation right now. And you mentioned with electromobility being another transformation. Have you seen any other shifts or big movements in the industry during your career?

 

Guest: Indeed, yes. I would say that I have witnessed now first-hand 3 transformations. industrial transformations. The first one is lighting. My first company was Osram Opto Semiconductors. And then later, I was 8 years with a Korean company called Seoul Semiconductor. Both companies were in the field of optoelectronics. And at this time, these new technologies basically replaced all the traditional lighting technologies. And what started as a niche technology basically changed the entire industry within a— fairly short time period. So big market-leading companies were challenged and challenged in a serious way by game changers and new entrants. Then at my time at Infineon, I experienced a similar pattern with automotive at a much larger scale because the first one was optoelectronics only. But at Infineon Automotive, it was a much broader scale of or broader portfolio of semiconductors. So here we were talking about, and we still talk about because it's still ongoing, this transformation, electrification, e-mobility, but also software-defined vehicles. And when I say broader portfolio, it's about increasing computing power, MCUs. It's about battery management, sensing, connectivity, software-enabled features. This is all based on semiconductors. And now, after taking over the infrastructure segment, I see the same pattern again, that we have certain challenges in this industry. New technologies which have been there for some times are now reaching this inflection point, and they make solutions more efficient, more reliable, and they also enable new features. I see similar patterns now here. And I believe that we are ahead of the next transformation, which could be even bigger than the other 2. And there's one common thing; it's always driven by semiconductors. I strongly believe in the meantime, if traditional technology can be replaced by semiconductors, it will happen.

 

Host: And yeah, history often repeats itself. And you mentioned being there for the transformation of Infineon during these major milestones. But what can our customers learn? from these transformations on how to best deal with them?

 

Guest: Yeah, I mean, first of all, I would say that breakthrough technologies are never enough. So there is a lot more necessary to start a real transformation. I think what is important to know is that at the very beginning, the transformation takes a little bit longer than people estimate. Everybody's excited about it. They talk about it. The whole industry talks about it. But then, you know, everybody's waiting and it takes more or longer than people expect. But then when these inflection points are reached, then it's really accelerating. And that's also then faster than people anticipate. Second pattern I would mention is that It's never the product or the technology alone. You need to have the ecosystem. You need to have technology providers like Infineon for semiconductors, but then you need system integrators. You need governments to support it in certain areas or regions. You need utility companies. And last but not least, maybe also the end consumer. to make it really happen. I think that's a few patterns I have recognized over the last years.

 

Host: Okay. Yeah, it sounds like every transformation is bigger than just an industrial shift. It's really a societal shift, a government shift, something much bigger. And today we're talking about AI, and this whole series has been about powering AI. When most people think of AI, they think of Silicon Valley. Right ahead, right from the start. But the growth story isn't just happening in Silicon Valley, right? How are different regions dealing with the shift in AI, building the necessary power infrastructure for that? Can you tell me a little bit about the region? Sure.

 

Guest: What I observed over the last quarters is that we have a massive energy demand increase all over the world. And we see also massive investments all over the world. But the driving factors behind are different. As you say, everybody is thinking of Silicon Valley when we talk about AI. And that's also somehow understandable because it's massively what we see in terms of investments, what the hyperscalers are doing these days in the US. If you look into the statistics, you see that the demand increase of electricity in the next upcoming years in US is mainly driven by AI data centers. It's a large portion. Some people say half of the demand is coming from this. So that's why not a big surprise that we connect these 2 dots. But for example, if you look at China, the overall electricity demand is much larger. And yes, data center is also here a very important topic. They invest aggressively in this area. But it's also a fact that the electrification of the industry will take a huge portion. We have the infrastructure programs from the China government running, which has a big impact. And still, even though they are, I would say, number one in e-mobility, there's still some way to go to electrify the whole transportation sector. So that's about China. So then when we have a look at Europe, I would say also here data centers are important, but the driving factors are very different. So here it's more about digital sovereignty. It's about meeting sustainability goals. So the targets were defined some years ago. And it's also about, or still about renewables, to get more renewables for energy. generation, but even more important, how to get this energy then into the grid. So, that's the thing important for Europe. And then I just came back from India. That's also an interesting atmosphere these days because also here we see a rapid increase in energy demand. And that's coming from urbanization. It comes from buildings. It comes from HVAC heating. cooling, actually, not—

 

Host: Air conditioning.

 

Guest: Yeah, exactly. Maybe more cooling than heating. But that's also a big factor. And India is maybe special again, because here we talk about modernization of a whole grid infrastructure of a huge country. So, in a nutshell, I would say we see these investments all over the world. And the common pattern is that They're all looking for more efficient, more reliable, more intelligent energy infrastructures. And the positive news from our side is that I strongly believe that the infrastructure or the grid infrastructure for tomorrow will be a semiconductor-enabled power infrastructure.

 

Host: Okay. So it sounds like each region is approaching this challenge differently and that the race for AI is actually a race for power infrastructure. Is everyone at the same starting line?

 

Guest: Yeah, I mean, first of all, I would say that, you know, we say that roughly 3% of the global energy demand is related to AI data center. And this doesn't sound a lot, correct? That means 97% is something else. But the difference is that with the AI data centers, the loads are very concentrated. They're very focused on certain locations and that makes it somehow special because the grids as we have it today are simply not prepared for this. And that's important to keep in mind. And if you look at Europe, for example, 40% of the grids are older than 40 years. Or if you have a look at the US, I was told that the grid installation we see today were done between 1950 and 1980. And if I talk to my colleagues in the US, they tell me that if you have a new installation today and you want to connect them to the grid, it takes years to get approval. And if you ask me, what is the acute bottleneck? It's not energy generation. So, we are going to have enough energy, at least for some time. But to get it into the grid and to manage it properly from generation to transmission, to distribution, to storage, to conversion, and all these things you need along with the entire energy power infrastructure. This is where I see the main bottleneck. And that means back to your questions about the race, it's not only about the computing race, but also about how to deliver the energy needed for this. And this race is ongoing now, right now.

 

Host: Yeah. And there's no computing without power to compute, right? And we've talked in previous episodes about Infineon's role in computing, so inside the data centers. But what role do we play in this power infrastructure race?

 

Guest: Yeah, I mean, if you say the challenge is both the compute challenge and the power infrastructure challenge, I would say that Infineon is uniquely positioned in the intersection of these 2 worlds because I would say Infineon is A leading power company, a power semiconductor company, first of all. Second, there are different materials now in the room and we are able to manage all of them. We can manage silicon, we can manage silicon carbide, and we can manage GaN. So I think that's important. But also, worth to mention that it's not only about product or technology. It's a lot about, especially when we talk about infrastructure, It's about quality. It's about reliability. And I think it's also about decades of application expertise, what you can bring in. And talking about the unique position of Infineon, I would even add that we have been already successful in traditional markets. So now when we talk about emerging markets, we can transfer knowledge from these markets like e-mobility, like renewables or industrial automation into these new emerging markets. So, that's a value for sure. And when we talk about these kinds of applications, it's about SST, solid-state transformers. I think you had it, we had deep dives in your previous episodes.

 

Host: Yeah.

 

Guest: We are talking about solid-state circuit breakers to protect DC grids. It's about advanced UPS systems, energy storage systems, and a lot more. what will help us to modernize the grid. So, I would say the winners of this race will be the ones who really understand not only the technology and the product, but also the ecosystem around and able to work with the system integrators.

 

Host: And you mentioned a lot of emerging applications and innovations happening in space right now. But where do you expect the next big things to happen? Do you think the innovations will come from inside the data center or outside the data center?

 

Guest: That's indeed a tough question. I mean, from my point of view, when we talk about AI today, we talk about large AI models running at massive data centers, correct? I think going forward, It's also a lot about beyond the data centers linked to physical AI. And when we talk about physical AI, it basically means robotics. It means autonomous systems, industrial systems, let's say intelligent machines. And I think it will become important to have more computing power or more intelligence, I should say, where decisions are made. And that means basically at the edge, at these kinds of machines.

 

Host: Mm-hmm.

 

Guest: So, but still, I believe that the big cloud data centers will remain important. They will remain the backbone of computing. But for sure, we will see more intelligence moving to the edge because at the end, it will be about AI systems who are able to sense to compute or think and then also to act. This will be the next revolution ahead of us.

 

Host: Yeah, it's quite exciting to think about intelligence and things like robotics and things like automotive, different applications. But what excites you personally most in the next maybe 10 years or so?

 

Guest: AI in general is very exciting, to be honest. I mean, I'm pretty sure this will— we will see here more progress in the society. It is about production efficiency will increase. It's about healthcare. There will be a lot of impact on societies. And that's amazing what's ahead of us. But on the other side, now I am also very close to my new role, when I think about the infrastructure, which is accelerated now by the AI data center. It's a catalyst or accelerator for this. But every invest what goes today into the data center is indirectly also an invest in the power infrastructure. And this infrastructure, the modernization of the infrastructure, will accelerate then the electrification of industrial sector. It will help the electrification of the whole energy sector. And at the end, this will help to change the world in a way that we also have a more carbonless world in front of us, that we have an increasing productivity in all areas. I would say these things are very closely connected to each other. On the long run, for sure, the infrastructure part. Short term these days, of course, it's fascinating what's happening on the AI side. For sure.

 

Host: Yeah. Well, Andreas, thank you so much for taking the time to discuss the topic with us and to give us your perspective on the race for power infrastructure. Thanks for being here.

 

Guest: Thank you very much for having me.

 

Host: And to our listeners, what a great way to wrap up the We Power AI series. Across this season, we've seen how semiconductors help turn AI ambition into real-world infrastructure. And how efficient power technologies and renewable energy can help grow data centers and grow AI smarter and more sustainably. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with a fellow engineer and join us next time on The Podcast4Engineers.