ABB is a Swiss-Swedish multinational corporation

Multinational corporation

A multi national corporation or enterprise , is a corporation or an enterprise that manages production or delivers services in more than one country. It can also be referred to as an international corporation...

 headquartered in Zürich

Zürich

Zurich is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in central Switzerland at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich...

, Switzerland, and best known for its robotics

Robotics

Robotics is the branch of technology that deals with the design, construction, operation, structural disposition, manufacture and application of robots...

. ABB operates mainly in the power

Motive power

In thermodynamics, motive power is an agency, as water or steam, used to impart motion. Generally, motive power is defined as a natural agent, as water, steam, wind, electricity, etc., used to impart motion to machinery; a motor; a mover. The term may also define something, as a locomotive or a...

 and automation

Automation

Automation is the use of control systems and information technologies to reduce the need for human work in the production of goods and services. In the scope of industrialization, automation is a step beyond mechanization...

 technology areas. It ranked 143rd in Forbes Ranking

Forbes

Forbes is an American publishing and media company. Its flagship publication, the Forbes magazine, is published biweekly. Its primary competitors in the national business magazine category are Fortune, which is also published biweekly, and Business Week...

 (2010).

ABB is one of the largest engineering companies as well as one of the largest conglomerates in the world. ABB has operations in around 100 countries, with approximately 130,000 employees, and reported global revenue of $31.6 billion for 2010.

ABB is traded on the SIX Swiss Exchange in Zürich and the Stockholm Stock Exchange

Stockholm Stock Exchange

The Stockholm Stock Exchange is a stock exchange located in Stockholm, Sweden. Founded in 1863 it is the primary securities exchange of the Nordic Countries....

 in Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

 since 1999, and the New York Stock Exchange in the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 since 2001.
ABB resulted from the 1988 merger of the Swedish

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

 corporation Allmänna Svenska Elektriska Aktiebolaget (ASEA) and the Swiss

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

 company Brown, Boveri & Cie

Brown, Boveri & Cie

Brown, Boveri & Cie was a Swiss group of electrical engineering companies.It was founded in Baden, Switzerland, in 1891 by Charles Eugene Lancelot Brown and Walter Boveri who worked at the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon. In 1970 BBC took over the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon...

 (BBC); the latter had absorbed the Maschinenfabrik Oerlikon in 1967.