n NEWS July/August 2026 www.drivesncontrols.com 6 Data centres propel faster growth in LV drives market than previously predicted p ABB is buying the UK flow control, instrumentation and actuator specialist Rotork for around $5.5bn in cash, partly funded by the $4.8bn sale of ABB Robotics to SoftBank, which is due to close this year. ABB says the acquisition will strengthen its focus on automation and electrification, and expand its offering for large and complex infrastructure projects and industries. Rotork will operate as a division within ABB’s automation business. p Schneider Electric is buying the industrial data and AI software supplier, Cognite for $3.1bn. It says the acquisition will strengthen its position in industrial AI, adding that Cognite’s cloud-native platform, which combines a unified industrial data model with agentic AI capabilities, will allow users to “operationalise” AI in their plants, asset management and engineering workflows. Schneider plans to integrate Cognite into Aveva software. p Humanoid, the UK company developing industrial humanoid robots, has raised $152m in Series A financing, valuing it at $1.35bn. The funding – led by led by Prime Movers Lab, and including contributions from Schaeffler and Bosch – brings the total amount raised since Humanoid’s founding two years ago to $270m. It is the largest ever Series A funding for humanoid company in Europe. The company will use the capital to fund the next phase of its growth, strengthen its leadership, and accelerate its commercial deployments and business expansion. p Electro-Wind, the Stoke-on-Trent manufacturer of transformers, power supplies and other electrical equipment, has extended and refurbished its main production premises, adding new winding machines, ovens, air extraction systems and cranes. The 47-year-old, familyowned company now operates across three sites. Since acquiring its main factory in 2012, it has expanded its production capabilities, staff numbers, and the size and weight of its transformers. In 2024 its added new premises to make smaller transformers, allowing the main factory to focus on large, specialised projects. p The London-based spatial intelligence company, Slamcore, which uses proprietary visual AI and stereo cameras to track the position and behaviour of vehicles in factories and warehouses, has attracted $14m of funding from investors including ROKStar Ventures (a subsidiary of Rockwell Automation) and Toyota Ventures, bringing the total it has raised so far to $45m. In the past two years, Slamcore, which spun out of Imperial College in 2017, has deployed its technologies across more than 30 sites in Europe and North America. NEWS BRIEFS The Association of Electrical & Mechanical Trades (AEMT) has added three new categories to its annual awards for the UK electromechanical maintenance and repair sector. The first is an Electromechanical Champion of the Year award, created to recognise individuals whose skill, commitment, leadership and influence have made an exceptional contribution to the industry. In addition, the Service Centre of the Year category has been split into separate Small Service Centre of the Year, and Large Service Centre of the Year, awards, ensuring that organisations of all sizes can be judged against businesses of comparable scale. Entries close on 11 September, 2026. The winners will be announced at a presentation dinner in Coventry on 19 November. The 2026 award categories are: n Product of the year (sponsored by Sulzer) n Project of the year( EMiR Software) n Small service centre of the year (AEMT) n Large service centre of the year (Menzel) n Supplier of the year (DFA Media) n Contribution to skills and training award (Innomotics) n Rising star award (sponsorship available) n Electromechanical champion of the year (sponsorship available) n Sustainable organisation of the year (Hayley Group) n Diversity in engineering award (WEG) Details of the awards, eligibility criteria and online entry forms are available online at www.aemtawards.com AEMT adds three new categories to its awards for 2026 THE GLOBAL MARKET FOR lowvoltage AC drives will grow from $14.4bn in 2025 to $17bn by 2030 – an average annual growth rate of 3.4% – according to the latest research from Interact Analysis. This is an upward revision from the analyst’s previous predictions, driven partly by the massive expansion of data centres needed to process AI, cloud computing, cryptocurrencies and other intensive loads. Data centres are a highgrowth area for LV drives, with the US currently outpacing other countries in its capital investments. Over the period to 2030, Interact expects the Americas to achieve the fastest growth of any region, with an average annual growth rate of 4.5%. In 2025, the Americas represented 25.6% of the global market for LV AC drives, with revenues worth nearly $3.7bn. However, the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region (excluding Japan) is still the biggest regional market for LV drives, accounting for 38.5% of the global market in 2025, with revenues exceeding $5.5bn.The region accounted for more than a third of the world’s low-voltage AC motor drives sales last year. The Emea (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) region made up 29.8% of the global AC drives market last year, at just under $4.3bn, and was the fastestexpanding region with a growth rate of 4.7%. Although Europe has experienced weaker organic growth, the appreciation of the Euro against the US dollar has boosted the European market when measured in dollar terms. Interact predicts that global sales of LV AC drives will expand from $14.4bn in 2025 to $14.9bn this year – a year-on-year increase of 3.2%. “In the long term, we expect the low-voltage AC drive market to maintain a relatively steady growth trajectory over the forecast period,” says Interact market analyst, Renee Ju. “Our forecast is largely based on our manufacturing industry output tracker, under the assumption that market growth will be closely aligned with the performance of downstream industries. www.interactanalysis.com Global sales of LV AC drives by region (2024-2030). Source: Interact Analysis
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