ABB will be offering ABB Ability™ digital solutions to its Chinese customers via the Huawei Cloud infrastructure. This was announced at Huawei Connect 2019 in Shanghai, China, the annual flagship event of Huawei for the information and communications technology (ICT) industry, where ABB also showcased several ABB Ability™ solutions based on the Huawei Cloud.
For Chinese customers, ABB combines its leading industrial solutions and domain know-how with Huawei’s strong capability in cloud infrastructure and platform services. The two companies will collaborate and co-innovate, leveraging technologies of cloud, artificial intelligence, internet of things and industrial expertise to unlock the potential of the digital transformation of industries and ultimately benefit Chinese customers.
After a thorough analysis of different options in China, ABB chose Huawei Cloud due to its technology expertise, strong enterprise customer base within the public sector and its high compliance and cybersecurity standards. Huawei Cloud provides our customers in China with additional deployment options for particular ABB Ability™ solutions.
Apart from the cloud, ABB is also collaborating with Huawei on artificial intelligence (AI). During the customer event, an ABB manufactured robot using vision and AI deep learning (based on a Huawei AI Accelerator Module) demonstrated waste separation.
“This collaboration enables us to further grow ABB’s industrial digital solutions in the Chinese market, which represents our second largest customer base”, said Guido Jouret, Chief Digital Officer of ABB. “ABB is addressing the demand for digital transformation happening in all our customers’ segments, and increasing convenience for its customers in China.”
In November 2018, ABB opened a major innovation and manufacturing hub in Xiamen, China, representing a US$300 million investment. In October 2018, the company announced a US$150 million investment in a new robotics “factory of the future” in Shanghai and in May 2018, it inaugurated a new Robotics Application Center in Chongqing, the company’s fourth such site in China. ABB has invested more than US$2.4 billion in China since 1992.