11. The Internet of Things, Services and People

ABB (Asea Brown Boveri) is an energy and automation engineering corporation based in Zurich. In 1988, it resulted from the fusion of the Swedish ASEA company and the Swiss firm BBC. ABB employs approximately 140,000 persons worldwide in 100 countries, and comprises more than 330 consolidated subsidiaries. Its range includes products and solutions for power generation, transfer and distribution, systems and services for power companies, motors, drives and industrial automation as well as systems for the automation and optimization of industrial processes. ABB is a typical investment goods manufacturer with products, systems and services for the manufacturing and process industry. ABB was represented by the head of the research center in Ladenburg, Dr. Christian Zeidler, in the German working group Industrie 4.0 by acatech and the research union, whose results were submitted to the German government in April of 2013 in the form of “implementation recommendations.” Soon after the foundation of the Industrial Internet Consortium, ABB became a member of its committee. Both of these initiatives represent the most significant externally visible efforts for enterprises with regard to the next stage of industrial development, and are thus treated at the executive level. In several other initiatives in various countries and regions of the world, ABB is also active in cooperation with the respective local organizations.