What's the biggest constraint for ABB's future growth? Hogan answered,
"People. Finding the right talents with deep understanding of the
process." He's looking for people with deep experience in ABB's various
customer's industries. The talent search is not just technical, but
technical people with managerial knowledge and experience.
Managing Acquisitions
Big companies need to grow both organically and through acquisition. It
is so easy for acquisitions to go poorly. And ABB was just touting all
the acquisitions completed in the past year. So I asked Hogan about his
philosophy and action plan for successful integration of new companies.
The Baldor acquisition was large and strategically important. Hogan said
one key was humbleness. In other words, ABB didn't come in and tell
everyone to change the way they did business, wipe out management and
subsume the company's image. Instead, they kept every one of the top 80
managers. He has monthly updates about the process that includes
Baldor's management. In fact, Baldor's management is running the
combined motor sales organization. Similar with Ventyx.
Hogan concluded, "We have many organic growth opportunities in addition
to acquisitions. We are focused on technology to solve problems for our
customers. We're trying to know what our customers want and what we can
do to help them."
Discrete Automation and Motion
After that, I got an update on the discrete automation and motion
division from Ulrich Spiesshofer, global business unit manager, and Greg
Scheu, who is business unit manager for North America.
There are five strategic areas within the division with two key enablers.
The first is robotics. ABB is one of the global leaders in robotics.
This product area has rebounded from a loss in 2009 to profitability in
2010. ABB is "strongly, cautiously optimistic" about the robot business
in the near future.
The next area is industrial motion, which includes drives and motors.
Things that enable and control movement. ABB had a very strong base in
standard IEC motors. With the Baldor acquisition, ABB feels it is now in
a strong global leadership position. The strategic plan for integrating
Baldor's organization into ABB is to assure "you keep the soul of the
company while leveraging what ABB can do for Baldor."
Power quality and control is the next area. ABB has won a big contract
with Deutsche Bahn, the German train system, to retrofit the electrical
power system on a train. It is now running at 15 points higher
efficiency than before. Other technologies include stabilizing power
supply into automation, high end UPSs, and now a battery storage
solution.
For renewable energy markets, ABB has decided to focus on wind and
solar. The company has had a strong base in wind, but it has come late
to the solar party. But it is developing its technology for both grid
and consumer markets.
ABB entered Emobility on the charging side tied to its power electronics
capability. It is now working with battery and car manufacturers.
2 key enablers
The first enabler is packaging applications, that is, don't think about
selling individual components, but package them into solution packs.
The second enabler is service. Not just spare parts, but using
technologies such as remote condition monitoring and predictive
maintenance information for customers.
For more
Feed Forward content,
click here or
Automation World news,
click here.
