ABB plans to invest US$100 million in the Chinese market to enhance its innovation capacity in the area.
"The company invested about five percent of its revenue every year into innovation on products and technologies, which brought the company thousands of patents annually," Kurt Kaltenegger, vice president of ABB (China) Ltd, said yesterday.
He made the remarks at the sideline of the opening ceremony of the "72 hours Innovation-race" in Shanghai, which ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, funded with 150,000 yuan.
"As China is a key market and a key production country for ABB, it was a logical consequence that after the successful start of product development in MV in Xiamen, other technology centers would start as well," he said.
The protection of intellectual property rights is a major challenge for the company in China, Kaltenegger said.
"We have a patent organization which keeps an eye at ABB and its competitors to prevent us from infringing others' IPR as well as avoid other companies from using our technologies," he said.
ABB also provided a good platform for its engineers so that they won't leave to work for its rivals, he added.
The competition for talent is another key challenge for ABB and it has cooperated with several Chinese universities, including Tsinghua University, to train local people.
"PhD engineers from Chinese elite universities are on absolutely the same level as other high-ranked universities globally, and in some dedicated fields they are even slightly better," Kaltenegger said.
A total of 12,800 employees work for the company at present, with 1,500 of them recruited last year.
The company's global revenue grew 20 percent last year to US$3.4 billion on a yearly basis. Its orders in China reached about US$500 million in the period, accounting for 12 percent of its total orders and exceeding Germany and the United States.