“This manufacturing and R&D facility brings to life our vision for the factory of the future, where flexible automation makes production and intra-logistics more resilient, faster and more efficient,” said Marc Segura, president of ABB Robotics. “It embodies our commitment to the latest in flexible, modular, intelligent manufacturing and it represents our focus on AI learning technologies for smarter robotics. At our new R&D facility, we will co-develop new solutions with businesses to prepare them for a new age of automation in the world’s largest robotics market.”
The site’s R&D center, covering an area of 8,000 square meters, will create innovations in AI, digitalization and software, such as autonomous mobility, digital twin, machine vision and low-code programming software, to make robots more intelligent, flexible, safer and easier to use.
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These innovations, co-developed with partners and customers in ABB’s open lab, will help unlock new possibilities for flexible automation in new sectors like new energy vehicles (NEV), logistics, healthcare, food and beverage. Having trained more than a million people in China since 2005 through existing partnerships with schools and universities, the new site will continue to prepare and equip partners and end users with the skills to thrive in a new era of automation.
“Since ABB Robotics entered the Chinese market nearly 30 years ago, it has been supporting customers in all sectors from automotive and electronics to metals, plastics and logistics. Now with our new mega factory, we can meet the surge in demand for automation in China, particularly from new segments such as new energy vehicle manufacturing, wearable electronics, restaurants, healthcare, e-commerce, retail and service robotics, among many others,” said Rui Liang, president of ABB Robotics Division in China.
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The factory is the latest ABB Robotics and Discrete Automation facility to open this year. In July, a new global innovation and training campus for machine automation opened in Austria, followed by a new Learning Factory 4.0 in Berlin in September.
ABB employs more than 15,000 people in more than 130 cities in China, and China remains one of ABB’s most important R&D and manufacturing centers. As one of three ABB Robotics factories worldwide, the new facility in Shanghai, which replaces the existing site, will support customers in Asia. The factory in Västerås, Sweden, supplies customers in Europe and the Auburn Hills factory in Michigan supports the Americas.