Activist Cevian to stay invested at ABB as representative quits board

ZURICH (Reuters) - Activist investor Cevian Partners will remain invested in ABB, it said on Thursday, despite the departure of managing partner Lars Forberg from the engineering company's board.

ABB said on Thursday that Forberg would step down after its annual shareholder meeting on March 27, with Claudia Nemat, a member of Deutsche Telekom's management board, set to replace him.

Forberg joined ABB's board in 2017 as Cevian mounted a campaign for ABB to sell its underperforming power grids business.

ABB eventually sold the business to Japan's Hitachi in a deal announced in 2018, which valued it at $11 billion.

"Lars has been on the board for eight years and has been involved in developing ABB from a decent to an excellent and extremely well-managed company," a Cevian spokesperson said.

"We are convinced that ABB, even without Lars, will continue to develop well and create favourable returns for shareholders," added the spokesperson. "ABB remains a significant investment for Cevian."

Cevian, which at one point was ABB's second biggest shareholder after Sweden's Investor AB, has been gradually reducing its holding in ABB.

Cevian holds a stake of under 3% in ABB, the spokesperson said. ABB on Thursday reported its highest ever full-year revenue, operating earnings and profit margin.

(Reporting by Oliver Hirt and John Revill. Editing by Mark Potter)