Weekly Widget: Early 2Q trends and themes. Beat and fade.

Research evidence excerpt

Weekly Widget: Early 2Q trends and themes. Beat and fade.

IdeaMWhat are the key end market trends and themes we have seen so far in 2Q26

results.

(1) Another exceptionally strong order quarter for data center linked end

markets. ABB's 2Q26 Electrification orders grew by +60%, and were up 9% QoQ

from a very strong base. We estimate that ABB's data center orders were up >200%

YOY in the quarter. Interestingly, as we show in Exhibit 2 , the order beat at ABB's

Electrification division was 24%, similar to Atlas' Vacuum division at 23%. However,

clearly the beats at Atlas are arguably accelerating for Vacuum, which is not the

case at ABB.

What we also found interesting was management commentaries on the calls for

ABB EL and Atlas Vacuum. We felt that Atlas management struck a more confident

tone in 2Q26 than in 1Q26 on Vacuum, clearly highlighting 3Q26 activity for Vacuum

can remain at 2Q levels (which may actually prove conservative). Atlas also

highlighted that some of its factories in Vacuum will need to more than double

output, in order to meet the demand from the customers.

While ABB is clearly relaxed on Electrification given the extensive backlog, it did

comment that there could be some variation in EL orders in the coming quarters,

and it may not hit record (ie >$7bn) orders every quarter going forward. This

comment does not change the fact that ABB's Electrification revenue growth could

land at 20%+ in 2027, but we illustrate it more to juxtapose the management

commentaries across ABB and Atlas.

The other clear takeaway is that expectations will now be for Siemens smart

infrastructure orders to increase QoQ. Current consensus has Siemens fiscal 3Q26

orders at €7.1bn (vs €7.5bn in 2Q26), and we estimate that this should actually end

up >€8bn (see Exhibit 5 ).