What significance do open source hardware and open source software have for the IoT?

Klaus Rupprecht: Open source lowers the barriers to entry, both technically and commercially. In the pilot phase, you can gain initial experience with open source without having to invest a lot. In addition, future engineers grow up with open source software and have a good knowledge and experience horizon when they enter professional life. It would be foolish not to make use of this wealth in professional solutions.

What is the best way to retrofit existing machines today?

Klaus Rupprecht : Minimally invasive measures are required, in the sense that the availability of a production machine must not be negatively affected. A practicable approach for us is to install a parallel system that does not interfere with the existing control software. As far as the data connection is concerned, we send IoT data via separate transmission channels. IT managers usually demand that access to production data is only permitted via special gateways and that it is strictly separated from the data flow to the server and/or the cloud.

Which open standards and exchange formats are relevant for this?

Klaus Rupprecht : The MQTT protocol certainly plays an important role here. As MQTT is used across the board via TCP, classic Ethernet transmission channels can be used. Sensor-to-cloud communication can be used robustly in an industrial environment with the use of MQTT. Our ecosystem works with this protocol.

So traditional fieldbuses are on the retreat?

Klaus Rupprecht: In my view, they will remain for a long time to come, but the trend towards Ethernet is increasing because almost all common protocols can be transmitted on this medium, including real-time-capable data transmission from critical measuring points.

What can be achieved with the OPC UA open standard and do you see any other standards becoming established?

Klaus Rupprecht: OPC UA is a mature technical basis that is now finding its way into applications. As a member of the OPC Foundation, we have implemented our own OPC UA stack on our edge controllers, primarily with the function of being able to use so-called Human Machine Interfaces - HMI for short - from third-party providers. We plan to expand connectivity step by step and offer OPC UA as a link to control devices from a wide range of manufacturers. The aim could be to bring OPC UA down to sensor level in the future in order to bring data from measuring points directly from field level to management level or even to enterprise level.