Mr. Urlaub, in October 2017, 'SCS open link' was presented by the aforementioned companies to great media acclaim. Since then, the new encoder interface has been rather quiet - has the topic not been well received by the market?

Jonas Urlaub: 'SCS open link' is a very intense topic, so we or each company in the consortium have had few resources available in recent months to spread the word about the single-cable solution via the media. Therefore, the impression you mentioned could well arise. In reality, however, things are quite different: we have already received a number of inquiries, held many technical discussions and also made concrete implementations. In short, we will see many innovations to SCS open link in 2019.

Can you be more specific?

Jonas Urlaub: There are currently a few key developments that we are rolling out with our community. For example, the safety certification of the protocol was completed in the first quarter of 2019. This was an important step towards simplifying the implementation of SCS open link. There will also be a bus functionality that enables additional sensors to communicate as participants - and not physically below the encoder node, but in parallel to it, as is known from a fieldbus.

In addition to the protocol, you wanted to standardize the mechanical connection concept. What has happened in this respect?

Jonas Urlaub: Unfortunately, we have to admit that we were perhaps too ambitious. Designing a standard is not difficult, but unfortunately bringing it to life is. In other words, reality has caught up with us for the time being and the project has unfortunately failed due to a lack of willingness on the part of other systems on the market, meaning that there will be no real mechanical standard in the foreseeable future.

To date, not a single drive provider can be found on the SCS open link website. Are drive manufacturers not interested in the new single-cable solution? In other words, wouldn't it be important for the success of SCS that there is a clear commitment to SCS from the drives sector in particular - ideally from leading companies such as Siemens or SEW?

Jonas Urlaub: That's right. The manufacturers who are working on it have not yet published their commitment to it themselves. That's why we can't name any names here yet. Most manufacturers don't see SCS open link as an alternative that the user can choose, but are instead putting together a specific benefits package for their customers - in some cases, this goes hand in hand with new motors or new drives. We will also be removing further hurdles for easy implementation in 2019. The certificate was just the first step. We are also pushing ahead with further technical development so that we can also implement the ideas of tomorrow in terms of speed, flexibility and the processing of non-cyclical data. We will announce this at the appropriate time.

You also wanted to see SCS not reduced to just another protocol for displacement and angle sensors, but as a protocol that is also suitable for integrating other drive-related sensor functions. What response did you get to this?

Jonas Urlaub: The response was and continues to be great. The further development in terms of sensors mentioned at the beginning has been very well received. We actually see SCS open link as an interface between the mechanical drive with everything that is installed and connected around it and the electronic drive controller. However, we have only had really in-depth discussions with a few manufacturers as we did not want to slow down the important certification step and further developments. However, we will pick up speed again in this area at the end of 2019 in order to be able to present more sensor manufacturers to the community. Everyone is invited to actively approach us again.