Deutsche Bank has advised ABB, the Swedish-Swiss conglomerate, for the first time, on the €203m ($233m) sale of its Nordic and Russian building materials business.

As part of its efforts to cut its $6.5bn debt pile, ABB will sell the division to YIT, the Finnish services company. ABB has used a variety of investment banks on previous mergers and acquisitions and capital markets deals, including Credit Suisse First Boston, Merrill Lynch and Citigroup.