Re Contract

ABB Ltd
15 May 2001

Norsk Hydro awards US$ 110 million contract to ABB
Two-year extension of frame agreement is a customer success story

Zurich, Switzerland, May 15, 2001 - ABB says today that Norsk Hydro, the
Norwegian energy resource group, has awarded the company a two-year. US$110
million contract to continue maintaining and modifying oil and gas installations
as in the North Sea.

ABB say Norsk Hydro has extended an existing maintenance and modification (M&M)
frame agreement.  Frame agreements of this sort generally include engineering,
procurement, fabrication, installation and assistance during commissioning. 
This particular agreement, says ABB, employs approximately 500 people in Norway.

'It is a vote of confidence that Norsk Hydro wishes to continue the cooperation
with ABB' says Gorm Gundersen, executive vice president and head of ABB's oil,
gas and petrochemicals division.  'We see this as a confirmation that our
technologies and skills are ahead of the market.'

ABB's frame agreement with Norsk Hydro was originally signed in 1994.  The
contract was the first of its kind on the Norwegian shelf and marked a change in
maintenance philosophy, wherein oil companies started outsourcing more of their
regular work to a single partner.  Today, most of the maintenance and
modification work on the Norwegian shelf is regulated through contracts like
these.

In addition to the contract with Norsk Hydro, ABB has similar frame agreements
with both Statoil and Philips Petroleum Company Norway.

ABB (www.abb.com) serves manufacturing, process and consumer industries,
utilities, and the oil and gas sector, with 160,000 employees in more than 100
countries.