ATLANTA — It took five months to find a successor to University System of Georgia Chancellor Sonny Perdue, and after looking far and wide the Board of Regents picked someone close to home.
The new university system leader already has a building named after him at Georgia Tech and served on the Tech Foundation board.
Thomas A. Fanning will come out of retirement to be the next leader of Georgia’s 25 public colleges and universities.
He comes to the job with a grounding in business, having led Southern Company for 13 years and chaired the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta board.
The Regents named him the sole finalist for the job on Wednesday.
“Our university system’s strong reputation brought us exceptional candidates from across the country, but Tom Fanning stood out immediately,” Board Chair David B. Dove said in a statement. “With four decades of experience running one of the largest energy companies in the nation, Tom knows how to manage complex operations, solve big problems and lead people. He cares deeply about Georgia, understands the power of higher education and has the proven leadership to guide USG forward.”
Southern Company serves about 9 million electric and gas customers in Georgia and eight other states. Fanning started there in 1980 as a financial analyst.
The Tech grad, who also earned a master’s degree in industrial management from the Institute, rose through 15 roles at Southern Company before being named chairman, president and CEO in 2010, a position he held until his retirement in 2023.
On the way, he served in management, finance, technology and strategy roles.
He has also served as inaugural chair of the federal Cybersecurity Advisory Committee when it first met in 2021. The group advised the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
Fanning was awarded an honorary doctorate by Tech, where the new Student-Athlete Performance Center is named in his honor.
“The University System of Georgia is second to none when it comes to keeping a top-tier college education affordable and connecting students directly to great careers,” he said in a statement. “Having earned my degrees here and worked alongside these campuses throughout my career, I know how much this system means to Georgia families.”
Fanning succeeds Perdue, who announced his retirement in April, after leading the university system for four years. Before that, Perdue served as Agriculture Secretary for President Donald Trump during his first term in the White House and as Georgia’s first Republican governor since Reconstruction starting in 2003.