Editorial

Welcome

Welcome to the August 2018 OPC Connect newsletter. The word is out… OPC UA continues to be recognized as the international communication and information standard for Industrie 4.0; end-users all across industrial segments and beyond are demanding OPC UA information interoperability from their suppliers. Collaborations with diverse organizations are pushing the release of companion specifications to enable the use of OPC UA in other vertical markets.
Read more and thank you for taking time out from your busy day to explore this edition of the OPC Connect newsletter.

How OPC UA Information Modeling Powers IIoT/I4.0 Era Products

Examples of the benefits of IIoT era open data sharing throughout the plant or factory shop-floor and the rest of the enterprise are easy to come by. What is not as obvious is how important (and difficult) it is to preserve and utilize the context of the shared data so systems can interpret and use the data they receive from 3rd party sources.

President’s Welcome

Welcome to this edition of the OPC Connect newsletter. Hannover 2018 in April was a smashing success, as was the recent OPC Day Europe. Everywhere you looked OPC UA was prominently displayed and being demonstrated showing commitment to OPC UA technology.

Companion Specs Drive IIoT Adoption – from Beeond [Sponsored]

IIoT is not just a buzzword, but a real phenomenon that is being driven by standards organizations like OPC Foundation, OMAC and AMT. Both the PackML and the MTConnect companion specifications include standard OPC UA information models so that all machines look and act the same.

President’s Welcome – April 2018

The months of April and May are shaping up to be a momentous time for the OPC Foundation. We will be exhibiting at Hannover Messe, Hall 9 – Booth A11, at the end of April for which excitement has grown to a fever pitch.
The long-anticipated OPC UA PubSub standard has been released expanding even further the breadth of applications for our technologies.
Finally, membership in the OPC Foundation has reached an all-time high due to demand from the industry for OPC UA enabled products. Is your company a member?
Please enjoy this edition of OPC Connect!

OPC UA – The Security Solution for the Internet of Things

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a vision of a world where billions of smart devices collaborate with each other across the Internet. Fortunately, OPC UA has an end-to-end security solution that ensures privacy and integrity of data sent via a broker (like AMQP or MQTT).

How & Why End-Users Should Deploy OPC UA from Beeond, Inc.

End-users in manufacturing, oil & gas, energy, and building automation are all in the early stages of deploying OPC UA. But still many companies struggle to understand the business benefits and to justify the investment of transforming their current technology infrastructure to OPC UA. Here’s a 5-step guide.

Extended OPC UA Modeling Services from Unified Automation

The modeling capabilities in OPC UA are rated the most valuable feature of the OPC Unified Architecture Standard. Unified Automation offers extended modeling services to their customers and has contracted the reputable OPC UA expert Dr. Wolfgang Mahnke.

President’s Welcome to 2018

Welcome to the first edition of the OPC Connect newsletter in 2018. After taking a brief hiatus from this column I am back to tell you about all the exciting things the OPC Foundation is looking forward to this year. 2018 promises to be a very interesting year for the OPC technology, the overall OPC membership, and the community-at-large. Thank you for taking time out of your busy schedule to read this edition of the OPC Connect newsletter.

The Industrial IoT Maturity Model

Just connecting your machine to the internet is not enough. A new model is helping to guide decision makers along a successful path in the manufacturing space.

2017 Wrap: End-Users Pushing OPC UA

“We are experiencing an incredibly successful rate of global adoption,” says Stefan Hoppe, Global Vice President of the OPC Foundation, looking back on the SPS show. End-users are putting pressure on their machine suppliers to implement OPC UA for their production processes. In the last year alone, 100 new members have joined the Foundation in a wave of member acquisition. In Germany, the VDMA and its 38 trade associations in particular are pushing forward the idea of OPC UA Companion Specifications.