ABB has been actively narrowing its business focus, and most recently began the sale of its power-conversion unit that helps telecom and tech companies run infrastructure and use energy more efficiently. The unit had been acquired last year from General Electric, which had acquired it back in 2011. While no final decisions on the divestment has been made yet, sources said that it is being managed by Citigroup and that the power conversion business has annual sales of more than $400 million with customers including giants such as Google, Cisco, and Verizon.

ABB's patent portfolio in the Energy Financial Settlement sector is quite diversified, providing the opportunity to expand its products and services into a variety of areas. More importantly, however, the units that are being sold suggest that ABB is intending to focus on robotics and automation. This may lead to decreased patent activity in this sector from the Swiss-Swedish Fortune 500 company, while its purchasers continue to invest in and expand upon the acquired IP.