Just a few more nights of sleep and … you are invited to celebrate 20 years of OPC UA– the key foundation for the digitalization of the industrial world.
Developed in only three years, released in 2006, and still maintaining full backward compatibility, OPC UA has been accepted around the globe as the engineers’ choice for a common, global information and data language for all assets, systems, and services. It enables industrial software to get a single source of truth to interpret their data, thereby, connecting the worlds of IT and OT in production. This makes OPC UA the perfect choice for industrial data ecosystems in which information flows from the shop-floor to IT/cloud interoperable.
No wonder OPC UA serves as a central semantic foundation for digital industrial applications—from digital twins (we reported about Renault Group here) to AI agents (see the success story from Philip Morris here and Airbus: “OPC UA as Key for AI”).
Welcome to this December Edition and to my slightly longer Welcome article – instead of splitting the many updates into several articles, I decided to provide a high-level overview here.
Maybe we need to think about two additional newsletters per year due to the sheer number of facts and news—but on the other hand, we try not to spam you. Please send me your feedback about your preference!
General Assembly Meeting 2024 – Recording
Please read or listen to the 79-minute recording of the OPC Foundation General Assembly 2025. Download the presented slides here – the first slide contains the link to the recording.
Some facts:
- Membership: Despite losing a couple of small Class-D members unfortunately due to economic challenges in Germany and France, membership still grew to 1,019 members worldwide.
- Budget: Our 2025 budget increased to USD 5.66M (up from USD 5.37M in 2024), largely due to new Class-A enterprise members.
- Board of Directors Election:
With 8 candidates for 7 seats, this was an open, democratic election. Congratulations to the newly elected BoD colleagues. More details here.
Updates
Field
The OPC UA FX specifications for configurable controller-to-controller communication were released last year, and the OPC Lab is now prepared to accept mandatory certification applicants. For the first time in history, the OPC Foundation is also not only focusing on protocols but also on the physical layer: The European OPC Lab received the first device to perform Ethernet-APL physical layer certification.
Congratulations to Peter Lutz and all volunteers for reaching the next milestone: TÜV readiness certification for OPC UA Safety. Read more here.
Cloud
The major global cloud providers not only published their updated reference architectures – they also made an impressive report: 7 of 9 milestone topics are now marked “Done”!
Interoperability in edge/cloud business applications is key for the future, and OPC UA, as a rich meta-modelling language, is rapidly expanding in cloud scenarios. Read more from the two co-chairs Erich Barnstedt and David Tobon here.
New CTT Release – Companion Spec Support in Early Development
The CTT tool now includes 2000+ test scripts to validate OPC UA Servers and Clients.
But this tool is not only helpful for the “after development phase” to increase compliance with the standard: With this new edition, Companion Specifications are integrated, enabling early-phase validation of namespace implementations – so developers can verify the external interface before investing further effort. Details here.
Success Stories
2025 already featured a success story from Procter & Gamble, USA. Now we continue with two more—from China and Europe—highlighting OPC UA’s worldwide impact.
China is, without doubt, the production country for the world, and OPC UA is not only a Chinese national standard (GB/T 33863.x), but is, for sure, used incredibly in Chinese factories. Until now, we have not been allowed to report on most of these uses of OPC UA, which makes it even more meaningful to proudly present this Chinese success story: OPC UA enables the company Kunying Digital Technology to achieve flexible, intelligent manufacturing in the machine industry.
China: Kunying Digital Technology
Jiatai Group—founded in 1991, along with a major Shenzhen factory since 2000—produces over 6,000 watches daily, including many world-renowned brands. The OPC UA–based intelligent machining control and management system supports high-quality development and national industrial transformation.
Maybe you are wearing a little piece of OPC UA on your wrist? Read more here.
Europe (Austria): ASFINAG & evon
Austria’s complex tunnels require the highest safety standards. ASFINAG, together with technology partner evon, relies on OPC UA for reliable, interoperable, secure, standardized, and redundant communication across diverse systems—scaling to 6 million data points across 2,200 km while keeping operations transparent and controllable. Read more here.
Events
- SPS Show Nuremberg, Nov 25-27, 2025, Germany
The SPS trade show in Nuremberg is one of the flagships of automation-focused trade shows. The OPC Foundation demonstrated the power and future direction of OPC UA on our booth, including 10 sponsors IBH Softec, InchStone, Matrikon, ProSys OPC, PTC, Rockwell Automation, Siemens, Softing Industrial Automation, Unified Automation. Next to all of the OPC UA for field demos, we also showed a PoC developed by Siemens and IDTA, with help of OPC Foundation, that unified AAS and OPC UA into one technology (based on the richer and stabile OPC UA meta modelling language). See flyer here https://opcfoundation.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/11/PoC-Unifying-AAS-OPC-UA-Flyer.pdf
. - Hannover Messe Riyadh, Dec 1-3, 2025, Saudi Arabia
My first time in Saudi Arabia—and I truly enjoyed the remarkable kindness of the people. While OPC Classic is widely known due to its roots in the 1990s process industry, many were not yet aware of OPC UA as the meta-modelling language for plants and factories. We are right on time: Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 plans to establish 26,000 factories in the next 10 years. I will continue engaging with leading companies and integrators.
. - IIFES 2025, Nov 19-21, 2025, Japan
OPC Japan exhibited at IIFES2025, held at Tokyo Big Sight for three days from Wednesday, November 19th to Friday, November 21st, 2025. IIFES was created in 2019 through the merger of the System Control Fair (SCF), Japan’s leading comprehensive automation exhibition, and Measurement & Control Tokyo, one of Japan’s largest specialized exhibitions for measurement and control. Read more here.
Technology News: 40 Publications in 2025! Call for Reviews and Participation
- In 2025, we have already published an incredible 45 specifications! (in 2024, that number was only 29) This shows the HUGE activities of members inside the OPC Foundation and their willingness to cooperate!
My BIG THANK YOU to the OPC UA community around the world! - This page shows the great work of the community in a very simple and transparent way – please subscribe to the “Technology newsletter”.
https://opcfoundation.org/news/technology-news
Companion Specifications
In 2025, the OPC Foundation — focused on >how< to securely exchange information — together with its partners — focused on >what< information is exchanged — published 20 new OPC UA Companion Specifications.
A special thank you goes to Karl Deiretsbacher, who significantly improved the organization and accessibility of content from more than 160+ working groups, making it much easier to find relevant information. You can start exploring it here.
We also launched several new Joint Working Groups. One I would like to highlight is “OPC UA for Battery Solutions,” hosted by Fraunhofer FFB in Münster, Germany — the country’s central Battery Hub. From the production cell all the way to the battery passport, a broad consortium is collaborating to define everything required for the digitalization of the battery domain, based on OPC UA. Participants include associations such as Catena-X, IDSA, IDTA, OPC Foundation, VDA, and VDMA, along with initial industry members Huawei and Microsoft. The group has just started its work. If you are interested in joining, you can find more information here
Upcoming
- OPC Days Oslo and Helsinki, Dec 9th and 10th, 2025
As this newsletter goes out, I may be in Oslo or Helsinki with large local communities eager to learn about OPC UA. A report will follow in the next edition.
. - AI in the world of research: Orbit as a Laboratory
As mentioned in the intro, OPC UA is a central semantic foundation for interoperability, digital twins, and AI.
Following Airbus’ remarkable success story about OPC UA in civil rocketry, they now share insights on using AI in research.
Please register for the livestream on Dec 15th, 2025 at 2:00 pm CET here
Events 2026
OPC Foundation is always adjusting its participation in international trade shows and activities around the globe in order to demonstrate secure, semantic interoperability, scaling from field to cloud, as well as digital twins. The call for sponsors for international events in 2026 has been posted on the OPCF website:
Call for sponsors https://opcfoundation.org/advertising/
List of activities 2026 – see details here https://opcfoundation.org/events/
Traveling Around the World
Current hype: The Universal Namespace (UNS)
At conferences and trade shows, I see many—mostly younger—experts presenting UNS as the latest and greatest foundation for interoperability. The easily transported message: UNS is the circle in the middle, and all assets and services are connected to it.
During the last conference, I took the liberty to ask: “Who is normalizing the data inside this central UNS bubble?” The open and honest answer was: “That’s what we deliver as an integrator.”
My arguments are always the same:
- UNS is not a technology; it is an architecture to centralize all data—and that’s fine, if someone prefers it. We at the OPC Foundation don’t mind.
- The critical part is the normalization of the data. This should come from an internationally accepted single source of truth—exactly like the data coming out of OPC UA servers defined by domain experts in Companion Specs for nearly 20 years. Otherwise, “Christian’s UNS” on shop floor A is not compatible with “Peter’s UNS,” and certainly not with “Mikes’ UNS” at other companies.
In short: End users should be cautious about a big new “hug” from UNS integrators who want to define their own versions of normalized data.
Listen to the OPC Foundation “OPC UA & UNS” video here.
Good evening, good afternoon, good night – wherever you are in the world
It has been a long and intense year, filled with countless trips, meetings, and inspiring conversations with the OPC UA community around the world. As exciting as this journey has been, I must admit that I am also a bit tired and looking forward to some well-deserved rest.
With that in mind, I want to thank the entire OPC community for your continuous support, your engagement, and the great spirit we share throughout the year.
Just a few more nights of sleep and … lot of people in the world celebrate Christmas first. I wish everyone a Merry Christmas, peaceful holidays with your loved ones, and a healthy, successful start into the New Year.
In 2026 we continue with new energy, incredible ideas, and continued collaboration!