This week, ABB inaugurated its fourth research and development (R&D) center for the pulp and paper industry, in the presence of the Irish Minister for Enterprise and Trade, Dara Calleary. The Swiss group specializing in electrification and automation technologies, which has more than 100,000 employees worldwide, has invested several million euros in this new building located in Dundalk, Ireland.
The new center is dedicated to the ongoing development of ABB's Quality Control Systems (QCS), which measures, adjusts, optimizes and controls the quality of the paper web as it travels through the machine to the finished product.
"ABB's business in the pulp and paper sector is growing year on year, and this investment in the development of our quality control systems will allow us to maintain our leadership in the global market and advance the industry for the next generation of papermakers" joachim Braun, head of ABB's Process Industries division, said in a statement.
The center will be equipped with various new technologies, such as 3D printing, collaborative robots or augmented reality and virtual reality for training and service delivery and will also include a training center.
The R&D team currently consists of 40 people of 12 different nationalities and the center plans to hire 30 new people over the next five years. The goal is to build a team that includes experts in physics, engineering, electronics, mechanics, software and project management and sales.
ABB's three other pulp and paper research centers are located in Bangalore, India, Singapore and Stockholm, Sweden.
