The boom in investment in artificial intelligence continues to drive Swiss industrial group ABB’s business. The company reported strong demand for data center equipment in the third quarter of 2026, while its revenue and operating profit grew at double-digit rates.
ABB’s orders for data center products saw triple-digit percentage growth in the July-September period. The company continues a trend from the second quarter, supported by technology companies’ huge investments in artificial intelligence infrastructure.
ABB is among the industrial companies that are directly benefiting from the growth of AI infrastructure. The group produces electrification and automation systems, including power distribution and cooling equipment – two of the most critical systems for the operation of large data centers. According to the company, its technologies are used in about one in four data centers worldwide.
ABB's operating profit before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITA) rose 24% to $2.03 billion in the third quarter compared to the same period last year. The result was slightly above the average analyst estimate of $2 billion.
Revenue increased 14% to $9.70 billion, remaining just below the market's expectation of $9.74 billion.
Total order volume showed even stronger growth - by 40% to $12.06 billion. The operating EBITA margin reached 20.8%, compared to 19.2% a year earlier. Cash flow from operating activities increased by 5% to $1.86 billion.
The results show how the investment wave around generative artificial intelligence is spreading far beyond chipmakers and software companies. New data centers require huge amounts of electricity, systems for its distribution and increasingly powerful cooling, creating an additional market for industrial groups such as ABB, Siemens and Schneider Electric.
The International Monetary Fund also recently pointed out that huge investments in artificial intelligence and data centers are supporting global economic growth despite geopolitical and energy uncertainty. However, the fund warned that a possible rethinking of the expected benefits of AI could lead to a cooling of investment activity.
For now, ABB’s data does not indicate such a slowdown. On the contrary – The continued triple-digit growth in data center orders shows that building the physical infrastructure behind artificial intelligence remains one of the fastest-growing segments of the global technology investment cycle.