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ABB wins 5-year SA contract

17 June, 2009

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa. ABB, the leading power and automation technology group, said today that it has signed an agreement with Sappi to manage maintenance operations at its Kraft Mill in Cape Town, South Africa.

The ABB Full Service™ agreement covers a five-year period, and is the first agreement of its kind for ABB in the South African pulp and paper industry. Under the agreement, ABB will cost-effectively develop the plant’s maintenance operations and help increase its production efficiency.

“At Sappi we consider operational efficiencies as a strategic imperative,” said Jonathan Hermanus, GM Sappi Cape Kraft Mill. “The agreement allows the proven ABB methodologies to be implemented at Sappi Cape Kraft. The agreement also allow for the affected staff to improve their personal competencies in a leading technology company.”

As part of the agreement, ABB have assumed 31 maintenance employees and responsibility for all maintenance-related activities and equipment at the plant. ABB will manage the maintenance operations to contractually-agreed targets for plant performance.

The new contract complements more than 150 ABB Full Service relationships with customers in the paper, metals, mining, chemicals, oil and gas industries worldwide.

“The ABB Full Service™ concept is a partnership agreement where ABB manages and improves the performance of the customer’s production assets, thereby enabling the customer to focus on their core competencies,” said Shiven Sukraj, country service manager, ABB South Africa. “We work with our customers to add value to their bottom line by managing maintenance costs and improving overall equipment effectiveness through the implementation of proven best practices and the use of ABB’s significant pool of experts in the maintenance environment.”

Sappi is the world’s largest producer of coated fine paper and chemical cellulose, with over 17 000 employees on four continents and customers in over 100 countries. Sappi produces 6.9 million tonnes of paper and 3.5 million tonnes of pulp a year. Sales were US$5.9 billion in 2008. Sappi has four paper mills in the USA, 10 in Europe and six in South Africa, plus two pulp mills in Southern Africa.