GE Digital’s thousands of customers are among the best-known brands in the world, including Procter & Gamble, Subaru, Qantas and Southern California Edison. In each case, GE Digital’s teams are helping to transform and speed up how those companies use data to help their operations — call it the industrial internet. Now GE Digital has a new leader: Scott Reese, an executive at Autodesk, will become chief executive officer effective Feb. 22. He replaces Patrick Byrne, who will continue at GE as chief executive officer for the Onshore Wind business at GE Renewable Energy.

Reese’s appointment comes as GE prepares to split into three companies positioned to lead in the important high-growth sectors of aviation, healthcare and energy. GE Digital, which was launched in 2015, will become a “critical part” of the new energy company GE plans to spin off in 2024. Solutions for digitizing the grid to make it more resilient, reliable and capable of bringing energy from diverse sources online have already become a major source of revenue. GE Digital has worked on projects with large utilities including Xcel Energy, Enel and Florida Power & Light. “[Reese’s] deep software industry experience makes him the ideal fit to partner with our customers and the GE Digital team to accelerate the energy transition,” said Scott Strazik, CEO of GE’s global energy business portfolio.

Reese has worked at Autodesk since 2003, most recently as executive vice president for product development and manufacturing solutions. He helped grow the business and led product and market initiatives across a wide range of industries. He also established Autodesk’s cloud platform and cyber-security practices.

Reese said he’s honored to lead GE Digital’s mission “to help accelerate digital transformations and drive decarbonization efforts” with customers. “With global scale and leading technology, GE Digital’s growth potential is significant,” Reese said.

Byrne agreed, saying GE Digital’s team is “at the forefront of the energy transition and I look forward to seeing GE Digital’s impact for years to come.”