Press Release

ABB Announces Joint Venture with Volvo to Make Robots for Car Making

12/06/96

ABB and Volvo Cars to Form Joint Venture for Automation Equipment

ZURICH, Switzerland, Dec. 3 /CNW-PRN/ -- ABB, the international
electrical engineering company, and Volvo Car Corporation, Sweden,
today signed a preliminary agreement to form a joint venture company
to supply automation equipment for automotive body assembly shops and
press lines.

The new company will include Volvo Cars' businesses for assembly line
engineering, press automation and lightweight welding guns, located in
Olofstrom, southern Sweden, as well as the operations of Volvo
subsidiary Olofstrom Automation in Toronto, Canada, Detroit,
U.S.A. and Sao Paulo, Brazil. These activities employ 260 people in
Sweden and 250 in North America and Brazil, with revenues in 1995 of
US$ 106 million.

ABB will have a majority shareholding in the new company and will be
responsible for its overall management.

Through the new joint venture, Volvo Cars will achieve a further step
in the streamlining of its operations, whereas ABB will increase its
resources for providing automation systems for automotive body
assembly shops and press lines to around 1,000 people. This will
substantially strengthen ABB's competitive position to supply more
complete solutions on a truly global basis.

The deal remains subject to approval by the parties and relevant
regulatory authorities concerned.

The new company will be part of ABB Flexible Automation which employs
4,200 people in 24 countries with revenues in 1995 of US$ 1.4
billion. ABB Flexible Automation is a business area within ABB's
Industrial and Building Systems segment, which employs approximately
90,000 people worldwide with orders in 1995 of over US$ 16 billion.

The ABB Group employs approximately 217,000 people with orders in 1995
of over US$ 36 billion.