Lynn Good will retire as CEO and chair of the board of Duke Energy Corp., effective April 1, and make way for 29-year company veteran Harry Sideris.
Good has led Charlotte-based Duke since July 2013—the company’s electric utilities now serve 8.4 million customers in six states, up from 7.2 million when she took the helm—and been its board chair since the beginning of 2016. Before being named CEO, she was Duke’s CFO for four years.
Sideris will take over from Good about a year after he was named president and given responsibility for the operations and customer service of Duke’s electric and gas utilities. Since starting his career at Progress Energy, which Duke bought in 2012, he has held a variety of customer, operations and regulatory roles. Before being named president last year, he was executive VP of customer experience.
“In an era of growth and rapidly evolving customer demands, Harry's experience in operations, customer service, strategy, and stakeholder and regulatory engagement makes him the ideal choice for CEO,” said Ted Craver, Duke’s lead independent director, in announcing the succession plan. “On behalf of the board, I want to congratulate Harry and look forward to him and his leadership team building upon the company's strong momentum.”
Craver, a former Edison International Inc. CEO and chairman who has been a Duke director since 2017, will take over the board chair role from Good come April 1.
Duke leaders signaled that Sideris was a likely candidate to succeed Good last spring when they promoted him as longtime executive Steve Young was preparing to retire after more than four decades at the utility. Word of his planned promotion comes a month after Pinnacle West Capital Corp., the parent of Arizona Public Service, said Jeff Guldner plans to hand the reins of that company to Ted Geisler—also on April 1.
Shares of Duke (Ticker: DUK) ticked up Jan. 13 to $106.14. They are essentially unchanged over the past six months, leaving the company’s market capitalization at about $82 billion.
