Vertiv, the Columbus, Ohio based critical digital infrastructure company, has appointed Frieda He as Chief Procurement Officer, effective May 5, 2026. She joins the company from Polestar, where she served as Chief Procurement Officer and Group Management Team member from December 2023 to March 2026.
In her new role, He will lead Vertiv's global procurement organization with responsibility for strengthening supply chain resilience, enabling growth, optimizing cost and value, and driving supplier quality across the company's power and thermal management portfolio for data centers, communications networks, and commercial and industrial applications. CEO Gio Albertazzi said in a statement that He "is a proven global leader with deep experience building and scaling resilient, sustainable supply chains" and that "her expertise in complex, multinational procurement environments and her track record of driving operational discipline and value creation will be critical as Vertiv continues to scale to meet accelerating demand from AI-driven and high-density digital infrastructure." He said she was "excited to join Vertiv at such a transformative moment for the digital infrastructure industry" and that the company's central position in the global data center ecosystem "presents a unique opportunity to create value through strong partnerships, operational excellence, and responsible, resilient supply chains."
He brings nearly two decades of procurement and supply chain leadership experience spanning automotive and electrification sectors. At Polestar, she oversaw more than $3 billion in annual global spend across direct and indirect materials, supplier quality, cost engineering, and real estate while managing enterprise transformation during significant industry disruptions. Prior to Polestar, she spent more than 13 years at Volvo Cars in progressively senior roles, most recently as Vice President and Head of Global Propulsion and Sustainability Procurement from May 2020 to November 2023, where she led a $9 billion annual spend organization and played a key role in the company's electrification transformation. Her career also includes procurement and supply chain roles across China and the Asia-Pacific region, building expertise in global sourcing, cost engineering, and supplier development. She holds dual bachelor's degrees from Northeast Normal University in China and an Executive MBA from the University of Oxford.
Vertiv, a publicly traded company on the New York Stock Exchange (ticker: VRT), is a global leader in critical digital infrastructure for data centers, communication networks, and commercial and industrial environments. The company manufactures power and thermal management systems and provides software, analytics and lifecycle services. Headquartered in Westerville, Ohio, Vertiv operates in more than 130 countries. The company has experienced significant momentum recently, with its share price rising 252 percent in 2023 and the company achieving strong first-quarter 2026 results that prompted management to raise full-year earnings guidance. In April 2026, Vertiv acquired Strategic Thermal Labs, a specialist in advanced liquid-cooling technologies, to strengthen its engineering capabilities for high-density AI and high-performance computing environments.
The appointment of a procurement officer with deep automotive supply chain expertise signals Vertiv's intent to address increasingly complex supply chain demands as it scales to meet surging demand for AI-driven digital infrastructure. He's background managing large, global, multinational procurement operations through periods of industry transformation and supply chain disruption aligns closely with the operational challenges Vertiv faces as manufacturing and sourcing requirements intensify. The hire suggests the company views supply chain resilience and cost optimization as strategic imperatives during a period of rapid expansion in high-density data center cooling and power infrastructure.
