Uwe Drofenik studied electrical engineering at the TU Wien, Austria, where he obtained his doctorate in 1999. In 2001, he moved to the Power Electronics Systems Laboratory (PES) at ETH Zurich as a senior assistant, where he led the development of simulation and optimisation software for power electronics. During this time, he was also co-founder and managing director of the ETH spin-off company Gecko-Research GmbH, and gave lectures and workshops for the European Centre of Power Electronics (ECPE).

In 1996, Uwe Drofenik was a visiting researcher at the Masada-Ohsaki Laboratory of the University of Tokyo, Japan, working on power electronics converters. In 2005, he received the ‘Isao Takahashi Award for Outstanding Achievement in Power Electronics’ from the IEE Japan.

Uwe Drofenik moved to ABB Corporate Research Switzerland in 2010, where he worked as Senior Principal Scientist on power electronics and magnet systems. His research focussed on highly compact converter systems connected to the medium voltage grid, in particular solid state transformers (SST), medium frequency transformers (MFT), high voltage pulse transformers, modular multilevel converters (MMC) for high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission, high power rectifiers, hybrid transformers and electronic tap changers. Medium-voltage converters are a key component of renewable energy systems such as photovoltaics and wind power, large energy storage systems such as batteries or hydrogen, as well as fast-charging systems for electric vehicles, data centers, large medium-voltage drives, hydrogen production and green steel.

In 2022, Uwe Drofenik worked at ABB E-Mobility on research strategies, patents and intellectual property (IP), as well as IP strategies. During his time in the industry, he wrote more than 50 patents and gave power electronics courses at ABB Corporate Research.

Since 2024, Uwe Drofenik is heading the Power Electronics Department at TU Wien, Vienna, Austria.