Zurich: ABB announced that it will launch a process to propose to its Annual General Meeting 2026 to decide on a 100 percent spin-off of its Robotics division. The intention is for the business to start trading as a separately listed company during the second quarter of 2026.
ABB Chairman Peter Voser said “The board believes listing ABB Robotics as a separate company will optimize both companies’ ability to create customer value, grow and attract talent. Both companies will benefit from a more focused governance and capital allocation. ABB will continue to focus on its long-term strategy, building on its leading positions in electrification and automation.”
ABB Robotics is a technology leader and provides intelligent automation solutions to help its global customer base achieve improved productivity, flexibility and simplicity to solve operational challenges including labor shortages and the need to operate more sustainably. Customer value is created through the differentiated offering of the broadest robotics platforms, including Autonomous Mobile Robots, software and AI combined with proven domain expertise to a broad range of traditional and new industry segments. More than 80 percent of the offering is software/AI enabled.
ABB CEO Morten Wierod said “ABB Robotics is a leader in its industry and there are limited business and technology synergies between the ABB Robotics business and the remainder of ABB divisions, with different demand and market characteristics. We believe this change will support value creation in both the ABB Group and in the separately listed pure play robotics business.”
The ABB Robotics division is a strong performer amongst its peers. Under the ABB Way decentralized operating model ABB Robotics has proven its double-digit margin resilience in most quarters since 2019. The market has seemingly stabilized – supporting the divisional order growth – after what has been an unusually volatile market situation which has included the normalization of order patterns after the period of pre-buys when the supply chain was strained. The company will be listed with a strong capital structure, is well invested with a solid cash flow profile and operates through its local-for-local set-up with regional manufacturing hubs in Europe (Sweden), Asia (China) and the Americas (United States).
The ABB Robotics division has approximately 7,000 employees. With 2024 revenues of $2.3 billion it represented about 7 percent of ABB Group revenues and had an Operational EBITA margin of 12.1 percent.
If shareholders decide in favor of the proposal, the spin-off is planned to be done through a share distribution, whereby ABB Ltd.’s shareholders will receive shares in the company to be listed (working name “ABB Robotics”) as a dividend in-kind in proportion to their existing shareholding.
As from the first quarter of 2026, the Machine Automation division, which together with ABB Robotics currently forms the Robotics & Discrete Automation business area, will become a part of the Process Automation business area, where the customer value creation ability in divisions will benefit from technology synergies for software and control technologies, for example towards hybrid industries. The Machine Automation business holds a leading position in the high-end segment for solutions based on PLCs, IPCs, servo motion, industrial transport systems and vision and software. The strategy and business priorities remain the responsibility of the divisional management team, under the ABB Way operating model.