ABB has announced that it will further deepen its long-term partnership with Volvo Cars by providing more than 1,300 robots and feature packs for the production of its next generation electric vehicles. The move will help Volvo, one of Sweden’s leading car makers, meet its ambitious sustainability goals.

“The automotive industry is undergoing a historic transformation, driven by the growing consumer demand for electric vehicles and the concept of sustainability,” said Marco Scon, global president of ABB’s robotics business unit. This transformation presents both new opportunities and challenges for global manufacturers. The latest commitment from our partner Volvo Cars underscores our shared vision for a more sustainable manufacturing sector. With our new line of energy-efficient large robots and OmniCore™ controllers, we will help its plants around the world achieve energy savings of up to 20%.

# Rich feature pack to enable multiple processes

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The agreement covers functional packages for a variety of production processes, including spot welding, riveting, gluing, flow drilling and ultrasonic welding inspection. Each feature pack is a customer-proven, plug-and-play combination of hardware, software and services that will be first deployed at Volvo Cars’ facilities in Torslanda, Sweden, and Daqing, China. In addition to hardware and feature packs, ABB’s latest OmniCore™ controllers will also help achieve energy savings of up to 20% on production sites. The controller uses efficient power electronics and robot braking energy recovery technology to significantly reduce energy consumption.

# Offline programming software supports “design once, deploy many times”

During the deployment of the robots, ABB will plan using its RobotStudio® offline programming simulation software to simulate and optimize the deployment of the robots prior to installation, ensuring that production is not interrupted. By developing and validating the required automation systems in virtual space, Volvo Cars and ABB will create solutions that can be “designed once, deployed many times.”

ABB & VOLVO

Volvo Cars and ABB have a long history of working together to improve vehicle production efficiency and enhance the capabilities of industrial robots in the field of automotive intelligence. The two sides will continue to work together to advance this latest project in the coming years, with the first robots expected to come online in early 2024. This is the latest in a series of innovative automation solutions from ABB designed to help the global automotive industry achieve its ambitious sustainability goals and transition to electric vehicle production.