The Technology & Solution Center at this year’s ABB Customer World (ACW) event in Houston, Texas this week was a colorful, buzzy display of futuristic conveyor belts and robots, an ABB Formula E Generation 2 car, and much, much more – 150,000 square feet of groundbreaking technology. It was an amazing display telling the ABB digital story from power generation to automation, production and transportation.
More than 11,000 people experienced the new ABB offerings this week at the George R. Brown Convention Center. As the pioneering technology leader in digital industries, ABB’s solutions are helping enterprises realize the power and efficiencies of today’s digital transformation. At the heart of the bi-annual customer event was ABB Ability™, the company’s innovative offering of digital solutions and services across all business areas. It is the largest digital start-up of recent years, which was launched only two years ago, also at ACW Houston.
In addition to showcasing its innovative technology, throughout the week ABB’s business leaders were presenting and speaking to customers in speeches, panels, and demonstrations about ABB’s role as a leader focused in digital industries. The keynote arena was an inspiring spot for the exchange of ideas and thought leadership about how ABB is changing the way we power our societies, produce our goods and services, and work, live and move.
Highlights included:
Building on the joint presentation of ABB CEO Ulrich Spiesshofer and Hewlett Packard Enterprise CEO Antonio Neri earlier in the week, ABB’s Chief Digital Officer Guido Jouret highlighted the potential of the new partnership with Dassault Systèmes, which was announced last week. This partnership will focus on the creation of so-called digital twin solutions. “In the last two years ABB Ability™ has gained momentum with co-innovation with our digital partners. We have developed over 60 use cases for Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality as well as Artificial Intelligence technology, using a common platform,” Jouret said.
Sami Atiya, ABB’s president of Robotics and Motion discussed in his keynote how ABB Ability™ solutions have changed the industry. “Using our smart sensor for motors, predictive analytics and machine learning we can now tell a facility manager how a motor is performing and if it will have an issue on the weekend when it might be difficult to fix, preventing factory shutdowns before they happen,” Atiya said.
Claudio Facchin, ABB’s president of Power Grids, participated in the program on the future of energy, discussing how the ways in which electricity is generated, distributed, and consumed are changing radically. “We already have the technology to interconnect power grids around the world but government regulations are critical for deployment.”
An additional program featured ABB Americas president Greg Scheu, futurist Tony Seba, and ABB president of Electrification Product Tarak Mehta discussing how electric, on-demand, and autonomous vehicles will disrupt the transportation industry. “ABB has been trying to help drive electric vehicle standards, but everyone in the industry must contribute to create those standards to be able to grow the market as quickly as possible,” Mehta said.
