Grid Instability Is Increasing rather than Decreasing | Ivan Paić, KONČAR

The US grid isn’t just aging. It’s being pushed to failure by AI data centers, electrification, and bidirectional energy flows that are wearing out transformers twice as fast as they did a decade ago. And KONČAR Group isn’t waiting for the market to catch up.

At APC Media, Alan Ross sits down with Ivan Paić, Board Member of KONČAR Group, one of Southeast Europe’s leading electrical engineering companies with over 6,500 employees and more than 70 PhDs in its electrical institute. With a new transformer manufacturing facility opening in Houston, Texas, KONČAR is entering the US market at a moment when lead times for critical grid equipment have stretched to four and five years.

The conversation reveals how a 50-year-old engineering powerhouse is positioning itself to solve America’s most urgent infrastructure bottleneck. Not just by building transformers, but by bringing a digital-first approach to grid resilience, cybersecurity, and predictive maintenance.

• Why US transformer lead times have hit 4 to 5 years, and why AI data center growth means the problem is accelerating, not slowing down
• KONČAR Group’s engineering DNA: 2,500+ engineers, 70+ PhDs, and an electrical institute driving next-generation grid solutions
• The Sanmina strategic partnership: how a contract manufacturing model will get the Houston plant operational by end of 2026
• Initial Houston capacity: roughly 1,000 transformers at 5 to 6 MVA, purpose-built for data centers, battery storage, and renewables
• Why bidirectional energy flows are aging existing transformer infrastructure twice as fast as 10 years ago
• KONČAR’s digital layer: predictive maintenance, optimized operations, and running equipment in multiple modes for modern grid applications
• 50+ years building control centers worldwide (SCADA, ADMS, distribution and transmission systems)
• Cybersecurity and critical infrastructure protection: why KONČAR invests heavily in both digital and physical grid defense
• The electrification imperative: why KONČAR sees grid reinforcement as the biggest challenge facing the US today

Guest: Ivan Paić, Board Member, KONČAR Group
Host: Alan Ross, Managing Editor, APC Media