B3 Press Releases For immediate release: 5th December 2006

B3 Cable Solutions take control of ABB (Ireland) Cable Company

B3 Cable Solutions (B3) today announced the successful completion of their acquisition of the ABB Cables business, based in Longford, Ireland. On 5th December 2006, the business became B3 Cables Solutions (Ireland) Ltd and will trade as B3 Cable Solutions.

In March 2006, B3 acquired Europe’s largest metallic telecommunications cable manufacturing business, located in Manchester. B3 announced a strategy to build a successful company through a combination of organic growth and acquisition. The purchase of the Longford business delivers the first milestone of this strategy.

Mike Walton, Chief Executive Officer at B3 explains, “This acquisition is important for the company’s strategy to build a group of companies under the B3 Cable Solutions name.

Purchasing the Longford business enables us to increase our market penetration in our established marketplace and allows us to diversify the group’s product portfolio and
manufacturing capabilities. This deal will also extend our existing blue chip customer base across Europe. Longford is our first acquisition, and we are working towards further acquisitions in 2007.”

The agreement was signed today in Dublin and the transfer of ownership was officially marked
with a handshake between Mike Walton, Chief Executive Officer of B3 and Frank Duggan,
Chief Executive Officer of ABB Ltd Ireland.