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€100m machine automation campus will train 4,000 a year
ABB has opened a €100m global innovation and training campus at the headquarters of its Austrian machine and factory automation subsidiary, B&R. The campus, located in Eggelsberg, will create up to 1,000 high-tech jobs. It includes r&d labs, as well as facilities for training up to 4,000 people from around the world every year in collaboration with universities.
The campus expands B&R's headquarters to more than 100,000m², making it one of the largest sites for automation production, research and training in Europe. The expansion will also free up space for additional production capacity to meet increasing demand for B&R’s products.
The site, which employs around 2,400 people, will get around 98% of its electricity from solar power. As part of the campus development, the site’s photovoltaic generating capacity has been expanded to 1.8MW, making it one of the largest PV installations of its type in Austria.
The campus will serve as an open innovation hub, where B&R will collaborate with international customers, companies and start-ups, as well as research and educational institutions, to co-develop automation technologies and train people needed for factories of the future.
ABB CEO Björn Rosengren describes the opening of campus as “a proud moment for our ABB as we create highly-skilled jobs while shaping the machines and factories of the future together with our customers.”
“This is a decade of transformation towards robotics and automation as our customers respond to global labour and supply shortages, accelerating consumer demand for personalised products and the need to operate more sustainably,” adds Sami Atiya, president of ABB’s Robotics & Discrete Automation business. He says that the new campus will serve as a collaboration centre “where we work with customers around the globe, helping them to respond to these trends and supporting B&R in becoming the partner of choice for the world’s most ambitious industrial automation projects.”
The global market for machine and factory automation is estimated to be worth $20bn at present, and is expected to grow to $31bn by 2030. According to ABB research, eight out of ten companies in Europe and the US are planning to further automate, and seven out of ten to near-shore or reshore their production from further afield.
Following its acquisition of B&R in 2017, ABB argues it is now the only company offering industrial automation users a complete range of integrated hardware and software for control, actuation, robotics, analytics and electrification.
• B&R has also unveiled a new brand identity that creates a visual connection between B&R and ABB.
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