The Next Wave of Power

On this episode of SuiteTalk, Hugo is joined by Alex Hsieh, the founder and CEO of Voltronic, to explore the journey behind one of the leading companies in the uninterrupted power supply (UPS) and solar inverter space. Together, they discuss the resilience needed when starting a company, navigating industry headwinds, and addressing the global demand for energy.

Comments are edited excerpts from our podcast, which you can listen to in full below.

Can you share Voltronic’s mission and what the company does?

Alex Hsieh: Voltronic’s core business is uninterruptible power supply, which makes up about 70% of the company’s revenue. We have around 5,000 employees across China, Vietnam, and Taiwan, including 500 engineers dedicated to research and development.

What makes Voltronic unique is our business model. We don’t sell under our own brand. Instead, we focus purely on design and manufacturing for tier 1 and tier 2 companies around the world[1]. Our clients include some of the biggest names in the industry, as well as regional customers in different countries.

The key is that we don’t compete with our clients. Many tier 1 companies still manufacture a large share of their products in-house, but increasingly, they’re shifting away from being just product suppliers and moving toward becoming energy management companies. That means they’re more open to outsourcing the smaller- to mid-sized products.

And that’s where Voltronic comes in. For us, building trust is everything; our role is to be a design and manufacturing partner, not a competitor.

Can you talk about your experience building two companies from scratch?

Alex: I started my first company, Centrillion, in 1988. From day one, we were a 100% original design manufacturer (ODM) that focused on UPS. At that time, the UPS market was tiny. If we produced and sold 400 offline units in a month, that was considered a big win. Today, by comparison, we manufacture closer to 400,000 units a month.

In 2001, I sold Centrillion to Phoenixtec, then the largest UPS ODM manufacturer in the world. The sale made sense: UPS is a highly specialized industry, and Phoenixtec already had the talent, infrastructure, and scale we needed.

After the sale, I continued leading my original team under Phoenixtec until 2007. That experience reinforced my belief that if you stay focused, take the long view, and build a broad product portfolio, you can achieve meaningful scale in this business.

But when Phoenixtec’s chairman retired in 2007, the company was sold to Eaton, one of its largest customers. I didn’t believe they could succeed at both branding and ODM, so I turned down their offer to stay.

And in early 2008, I left with six colleagues and founded Voltronic, starting again from scratch.

What gave you the confidence to start over when many people might have chosen stability instead?

Alex: I always ask myself what kind of value I can create in the time I have left in my professional life. I enjoyed working at Phoenixtec because there was still so much I could create in the UPS ODM space, but once that chapter closed, I knew I had to decide. Starting a new company again at the age of 48 wasn’t easy, but I felt I had to do it.

Tell me about the challenges you faced.

Alex: The challenges came quickly. 2008 was the year of the Global Financial Crisis. We built our factory in Shenzhen early that year, hired 200 staff, and had the capacity to produce 200,000 UPS units per month. But practically overnight, all the customer orders disappeared; we shipped only 2,000 units, just 1% of our capacity, in the first month.

By the end of 2008, my wife said to me, “Alex, if this continues, we’ll be out of capital.” The situation was extremely tough, but it also pushed everyone to work harder. While many companies were laying people off or cutting salaries, we did neither. Looking back, I think that was key to shaping our company culture and showed people that we would stand together through the hardest times.

By March of 2009, we broke even and then started to turn a profit. In Shenzhen, summers are brutally hot, but our staff didn’t even turn on the air conditioning that entire summer, just to save costs. Even today, with the scale we’ve achieved, our staff switch off the air conditioning at 7:00p.m. every evening.

That experience taught me something I deeply value: leadership is not just about strategy; it’s also about resilience.

Leadership is not just about strategy; it’s also about resilience.

What values guided you when it came to building a new company culture?

Alex: Voltronic’s organization is very flat, even with 5,000 people, and has a small management team.

The way I pass along my values is by working alongside my people. I’m very hands-on, even as chairman. Morris Chang of TSMC once said that a good CEO should spend 80% of his time on strategy and 20% on operations. I’m the opposite. I probably spend 95% of my time in operations, because I believe the only way to succeed is to embrace details and execute them as efficiently as possible. That’s why, no matter their level, our managers are hands-on. That approach has become part of our culture.

Take the severe supply chain disruptions during 2020 to 2022 when our semiconductor allocations dropped to 20% to 30% of normal levels. Every day, I sat with management reviewing shortage lists, going through them one by one and finding alternatives. That process—resilience, persistence, working side by side—defines our culture.

Why do you think the UPS/ODM industry has remained so stable for decades compared with other tech sectors?

Alex: It’s very mature. Technology changes slowly, and the competitive landscape hasn’t shifted much in 20 or 30 years. Even the supplier and customer base has stayed almost the same. In fact, over the past decade, there haven’t really been newcomers to the industry. It’s not what people consider a “sexy” business; if you want fast revenue growth, this isn’t where you go.

But because the playing field looks so similar, I constantly challenge my team with one question: “Why should customers award their business to us instead of someone else?”

For me, the answer is efficiency. I monitor it in every corner of the business.

How do you see global demand for power evolving?

Alex: I see two major directions.

First, global energy demand will keep rising, which is driving demand for higher-power products. For many years, most of Voltronic’s revenue came from small- to mid-sized UPS and inverters. But demand above that level has surged, especially from tier 1 and tier 2 customers.

Efficiency has also become critical, particularly in data centers and artificial intelligence (AI) data centers, where it’s now a core requirement.

The second direction is the energy transition itself, or what I call the “three Ds”: decarbonization, digitalization, and decentralization.

Decarbonization is key. We’re fortunate to be making products that directly support green energy. And in many developing countries, particularly in Africa, people have long relied on diesel generators during power cuts. But diesel is polluting, noisy, and sometimes dangerous. Now, with solar panels and lithium batteries becoming far more affordable, we see many customers replacing diesel with solar-plus-storage systems.

In addition, UPS was almost entirely hardware-based 10 years ago. Today, the industry has been digitalized, and software has become just as important.

And lastly, we now see more decentralized generation instead of one big power plant distributing electricity in one direction.

Global energy demand will keep rising, which is driving demand for higher-power products.

Do you think the hype around AI data centers matches reality, or will growth be more measured?

Alex: AI data centers are booming, especially in the past one to two years. Early forecasts were very aggressive in terms of capital expenditures and spending, and it’s true that their energy consumption is far higher than traditional data centers.

To give you a sense of scale: a regular server might consume 5 to 7 kilowatts, while an AI server can use around 20 kilowatts. NVIDIA’s infrastructure, for example, supports racks that draw 120 kilowatts each. AI data centers often run hundreds of racks, so a single facility can easily demand several megawatts from the grid.

That has raised concerns about whether grid infrastructure can keep up. As a result, operators are increasingly looking to alternative energy sources like wind and solar, creating opportunities for renewable product suppliers.

That said, I’m not fully convinced that AI data centers will be built in the massive numbers some forecasts suggest. They’re extremely complex projects, and you can’t just put one up anywhere.

Instead, I think edge computing data centers will become more important. This isn’t a new idea, but AI makes it more feasible. Edge data centers are smaller, consume less energy, and are easier to deploy in more locations.

For example, if an AI rack draws 120 kilowatts, we can install a 100–150 kilowatt UPS with lithium battery or supercapacitor storage alongside it. That flexibility opens new growth opportunities in supporting both large AI data centers and the emerging edge computing model.

Do you regret any decisions you’ve made?

Alex: Fortunately, not many. My personality has been shaped by this industry, where there’s no such thing as short-term wins or quick money. Success is built layer by layer, through steady accumulation over time.

I also believe that as a leader, it’s easy to say “yes” to everything, but much harder, and often more important, to say “no.” There are always temptations, distractions, and opportunities pulling at you. The challenge is having the discipline to focus on what really matters.

There’s no such thing as short-term wins or quick money.

Do you ever worry about burning out?

Alex: I have my own version of work-life balance, which might be a little different from others. I usually work until about 11 p.m. Monday through Friday, but weekends are for sports and family. Every week, I make sure to have a family dinner, and I keep up a regular sports routine. For me, badminton is the best.

Have you gotten better at assessing talent over time?

Alex: Talent development is always a challenge in the UPS industry. It’s a traditional sector, and for many years younger people were more interested in software than hardware, and more recently, they prefer semiconductor work over power systems.

So, planning and developing talent is a key part of my role, and I spend a lot of time coaching staff, talking, meeting, and discussing with people at all levels.

In addition, many young employees have limited experience, and their learning curve is steep, so by investing this time, we help broaden their perspectives and career planning, which accelerates their development.

At the same time, retaining talent requires investment. In Taiwan, for example, annual salary surveys rank us among the top 20 companies, even though numbers 1 through 9 are all semiconductor companies.

For a company in the power industry, that’s a strong signal that we value our people. But paying well isn’t just about compensation; it’s about showing our team that they can build a long, valuable career in this industry.

[1] Tier 1 and tier 2 companies refer to the level a company sits at in a supply chain. Tier 1 companies are the largest, most established brands in an industry, while tier 2 companies are smaller or regional players that rely on partners for manufacturing.