We collaborate with companies and academic institutions on a wide range of social, environmental, and technological activities and topics. These partnerships serve to foster knowledge exchange, enabling us to stay abreast of latest developments, contribute to innovation, provide access to talent, expand markets, and address complex challenges in a more effective manner. The engagement is done both centrally and at divisional level.

How we engage:

• Collaborations with academic institutions, to drive innovation, including themes related to sustainability.
• Participation in industry groups, to drive innovation and advance policy.
• Membership in sustainability-related international organizations such as Global Business Initiative on Human Rights (GBI), UN Global Compact, World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and the Responsible Minerals Initiative (RMI). We also collaborate with organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the Science-Based Targets initiative (SBTi) and with the International Code of Conduct Association (ICoCA).
• Technology and innovation partnerships with companies and startups to lay the basis for potential future direct investments or acquisitions.
• Various organizations promoting Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.
• Strategic corporate partnerships that enable the creation of local employment opportunities, infrastructure development, and local economic value.

Meeting customer needs and expectations is essential to our success. The engagement with customers on sustainability topics occurs primarily in the divisions and includes sustainability-focused meetings and projects.

How we engage:

• Customer requests and collaborations around ABB’s product offerings, such as an end-to-end approach and a one-stop-shop for building automation and smart energy management solutions.
• Our Key Account Managers and our customer service organizations address sustainability questions with customers, including through customer trade shows.
• Sustainability partnerships such as enabling take-back schemes.
• Assessing the impact of our products on customers’ sustainability performance (carbon footprint, circularity).

Employees are vital for achieving our goals and staying competitive. In an ongoing dialogue, we aim to bring employee perspectives into our policies and procedures. Employee engagement takes place at different levels across the organization.

How we engage:

• Annual Employee Engagement Survey, followed up with local workshops to discuss the results and define actions.
• Targeted pulse surveys on specific topics.
• Annual performance reviews.
• Negotiating with collective bargaining associations.
• Network of Employee Resource Groups promoting Diversity, Equity & Inclusion in the workplace. Feedback from these groups are collected through regular meetings and help inform policy and guidelines.
• Learning and development opportunities.
• Engagement and training on business conduct.

We engage with governmental, regulatory, political and economic stakeholders, local communities, the media, non-governmental organizations (NGOs) etc. at global, national and local levels. These key stakeholders provide the political and regulatory support and public trust necessary to achieve sustainable growth. Engagement with government and civil society takes place both centrally and at a divisional level.

How we engage:

• Direct dialogue with community representatives, where possible, to understand local and national needs both related to our own operation and to our value chain.
• Donations and volunteering.
• Meetings with regulators to understand their priorities and share our views on policy issues and advocate the deployment of low-carbon technology and energy-efficient solutions.
• Participation in national and international initiatives to address global issues such as Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, climate change and other sustainability topics.

The investment community enables ABB’s access to financial capital and includes such market participants as shareholders, debtholders, financial analysts, rating agencies and proxy advisors. Investor relations are managed on a corporate level through the Investor Relations team.

How we engage:

• Annual General Meeting.
• Capital markets days, including a specific section on sustainability.
• Group reporting.
• Investor relations website linking to our sustainability page.
• Investor roadshows and conferences including sustainability themes.
• One-on-one meetings, including requests from investors on specific meetings to understand sustainability performance.
• Press releases.
• Quarterly analyst and investor webcasts, including a specific section on sustainability.

Our suppliers have a significant impact on our operations and success as well as our ability to meet our sustainability targets. Working with suppliers allows us to identify and mitigate risks in the supply chain. While day-to-day engagement with suppliers is primarily done in the divisions, several of the engagement programs and supplier-related policies are centrally coordinated through topic-specific workstreams.

How we engage:

• Co-development of initiatives and early engagement during new product development.
• Collaboration to drive GHG emissions reduction.
• Monitoring and active engagement through our Sustainable Supply Base Management program, our Conflict Minerals program and Material Compliance program.
• Partnerships to access more sustainable materials.
• On-site evaluations and audits including interviews with the supplier’s employees.
• Town hall and supplier day events.