GEN-I once again among Europe’s best: Insights from Jan Bohinec, Trading director

The Energy Risk Commodity Rankings are one of the most established international benchmarks of excellence in the commodities world. This year, the GEN-I Group was once again named Best Power Dealer in Central East Europe (CEE) and South East Europe (SEE), while also securing second place in the Best Overall Energy Dealer and Best Overall Power Dealer in Europe. These results further confirm GEN-I's strong market positioning, credibility, and reputation among international market players.

We took this opportunity to speak with Jan Bohinec, Trading director at GEN-I, about his perspective on the significance of these achievements.

What do these recent awards mean for the GEN-I Group?

The Energy Risk Commodity Rankings are one of the most comprehensive and influential international surveys within the global energy trading community. They reflect the perception of market participants on reliability, price competitiveness, quality of service, and other qualities valued by the participants. These are the core values upon which GEN-I Group’s business strategy and daily operations are built.

Our continued strong performance in the rankings is a clear testament to the trust we have earned from both the market and our valued partners. The results highlight our ability to effectively combine two main strengths: our role as a major market player in CEE and SEE and our fast-growing presence across the broader European energy market, including Western Europe such as the UK, Belgium and the Netherlands. Maintaining a leading regional position while simultaneously strengthening our footprint in Western Europe reflects the robustness of our trading model, our capacity for innovation and a clear long-term strategic direction.

In your opinion, what is key to maintaining a leading position in these regions?

Our constantly high rankings in the CEE and SEE region confirms the stability and reliability of GEN-I’s operations in our core markets. From the outset, we have built our reputation on long-term, reliable partnerships, which have also enabled our international expansion.

At the same time, the energy sector today is highly exposed to global developments. In such a dynamic and volatile environment, long-term success depends on the availability to plot a successful path between strategic foresight, operational agility, advanced analytics, and disciplined approach to risk management.

At GEN-I, we recognised early on that adaptability would become a key competitive advantage. We therefore systematically developed a geographically diversified portfolio, reducing dependence on any single market or energy source, while enabling dynamic optimisation of cross-border energy flows. In electricity trading alone, our portfolio volumes exceed domestic Slovenian consumption tenfold, enabling us to capture broader cross-market synergies efficiently.

Reliability in partnerships, speed of execution, and flexibility remain key success factors in ensuring stable and sustainable business performance.

GEN-I is recognised as one of the fastest-growing energy groups in Europe. What is driving this growth and expansion – for example, this year’s entry into the US market?

This year marked an important milestone with the establishment of our subsidiary, GEN-I Trading North America, in Houston. This step represents our first direct entry in the global energy trading landscape. 

By expanding into the United States, where we currently have a team of around ten experts, we have gained direct exposure to one of the most liquid and sophisticated energy markets, as well as access to valuable market insights and expertise – particularly relevant as European market becomes increasingly influenced by global dynamics. 

This expansion is the result of a clearly defined strategic vision, supported by disciplined execution and a long-term growth mindset. Growth and continuous expansion are driven by a combination of continuous investment in technology and analytics, strong expertise and the commitment of our teams. 

Today, GEN-I trades in 27 countries. How challenging is it to manage business activities across so many markets?

Managing trading activities across multiple markets is inherently complex and requires a high degree of discipline, coordination, excellent analytical and forecasting skills, the ability to track geopolitical developments, and, above all a well-organised team of experts. Each market has its own regulatory framework, liquidity profile, and supply-demand dynamics.  This requires a strong macro understanding of European and global energy flows, and a very precise understanding of the microtrends on all markets. 

A detailed, near real-time understanding of the portfolio, down to intraday granularity, is essential. This is only possible with advanced analytical support and robust portfolio management systems. At the same time, it is extremely important to have a strict risk discipline across market and credit risk. 

How important is the development of trading infrastructure and advanced solutions to your success?

A good portion of our success can be attributed to the development of our own analytical and trading tools. Energy markets are becoming ever more data-driven, which is why we are investing in state-of-the-art models, algorithms, digital infrastructure, and data management capabilities. A high-performance, stable, yet agile IT environment is critical. This enables faster and more informed decision-making, as well as a deeper understanding of complex market dynamics. High-quality data is the foundation for advanced algorithmic trading and the increasing integration of AI-supported decision processes, which we are progressively embedding into our operations to improve efficiency and execution quality. 

The development of new business models is also an indispensable part of what we do. We are actively developing new business models and products aligned with the energy transition, including power purchase agreements (PPAs), battery energy storage systems (BESS), and investments in our own renewable and flexible assets.

What role does cross-departmental cooperation play in your success?

Cooperation between different departments is absolutely one of the pillars of our performance. Trading results are not achieved in isolation – they depend on strong support from analytics, IT risk, legal, operations, finance, and HR.When it grows and expands, an organisation inevitably becomes more complex. Our focus is therefore on preserving speed of decision-making, operational efficiency, and organisational agility. We achieve this through clearly defined responsibilities and a high level of trust across teams. 

This combination of execution quality, analytical depth, and organisational efficiency is ultimately what is recognised in international rankings such as Energy Risk Commodity Rankings.

How does international recognition impact the team?

International recognition like this has both external and internal value. Externally, it strengthens our credibility with partners and supports business development. Internally, it serves as a strong motivator. For our teams, it confirms that their work is recognised at an international level. We regularly make reference to our excellent rankings at meetings with partners – new ones who are only just getting to know us, and those with whom we have already built long-term partnerships. 

The award is as well an independent confirmation of the quality of our work but also has a very concrete internal effect. It reinforces motivation, sense of ownership, and long-term commitment. At the same time, we see such recognition not as an endpoint, but as an incentive to further improve and evolve.

Where is GEN-I’s current strategic focus when it comes to the region?

Our primary focus is on the development and optimisation of flexibility, particularly in the field of utility-scale battery energy storage systems (BESS). 

Our current portfolio includes around 350 MW / 800 MWh across Bulgaria, Romania, and Slovenia, with further expansion planned into Greece and Poland this year. Our goal is an ambitious one: to manage more than 2,000 MW of flexible capacity across ~10 European markets by 2028. 

Our key competitive advantage lies in advanced multi-market algorithmic optimisation, combining wholesale market participation (DA/ID), and ancillary services. This enables us to maximise value for asset owners while contributing to system stability. Multi-year, structured optimisation services that are bankable for investors are a key component of our offering. In parallel, we are expanding our PPA portfolio, which involves the management of solar, wind and hydro power plants in the region. The expected annual growth of this segment is at least 30% driven by increasing demand for integrated market optimisation services of the assets. 

What are your main goals for the future and how are you looking to enhance your current leading position on the European and global markets?

Our long-term ambition is to evolve from a leading regional trader into a global energy player. As mentioned earlier, we have already taken one important step in this direction by opening an office on another continent. Our strategy in the trading field is based on the data-supported optimisation of our global portfolio and the advanced optimisation of cross-border flows, which remains a key building block for our business. 

In the future, we will continue to consolidate our international trading platform and presence on strategic markets. We will focus a significant part of development to areas that will create the future of energy – above all, long-term renewable energy contracts (PPAs) and the management of battery energy storage systems. In this area, our goal is to become the leading aggregator of flexibility in the region and beyond. 

Jan, do you have any final thoughts?

Times are changing and with it the role of energy market players. GEN-I is evolving from a traditional energy trader into a partner for advanced energy management and flexibility optimisation. Importantly, we demonstrate that even from a relatively small market like Slovenia, it is possible to build a highly competitive, international organisation. This is ultimately a reflection of the strength, professionalism, and commitment of our team. And that is something I am and always will be proud of.