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Company patriarch Aloys Wobben: Retired in 2012 for health reasons
Photo: Wolf P. Prange / imago images
In East Frisia, Aloys Wobben once laid the foundation for Enercon, the largest German onshore provider of wind energy before Nordex.
Now the founder of the wind turbine manufacturer has died.
The Aloys-Wobben-Stiftung and the company announced this in a joint announcement in Aurich.
Wobben died after a long, serious illness.
He was 69 years old.
"The board of directors of the Aloys-Wobben-Stiftung and the Enercon management reacted with dismay to the news of the death of the founder and benefactor and expressed their deep condolences," the message says.
Enercon, headquartered in Aurich, Lower Saxony, has recently been struggling with increasing problems - and lost the connection technically and in terms of production costs.
In 2018, it was announced that hundreds of jobs would be cut, and talks with trade unions or the state government were rejected by the company.
Gearless system helped Enercon to achieve a breakthrough
In
2020,
manager magazin
counted the Wobben family among the richest families in Germany despite the worst problems.
In the ranking, it landed in 58th place with 3.5 billion euros. In 2019, it was still in 28th place with 4.5 billion euros.
According to the foundation, Wobben had studied electrical engineering with a specialization in energy technology after training as an electrical machine builder at the Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences and dealt with renewable energies.
He founded the company in 1984 and developed the first wind turbines of his own.
According to the foundation, one of the company's greatest innovations was the development of the first gearless and thus low-maintenance wind turbine in 1992.
Wobben, awarded the German Environment Prize in 2000, withdrew from the company in 2012 for health reasons and transferred his assets to the Aloys Wobben Foundation.
She is the sole shareholder of Enercon.
apr / dpa
