Industry 4.0 is changing the way manufacturers operate, but it is also transforming how SCADA systems work, and what businesses should expect from them. Long gone are the days when straightforward data capture is enough. To fulfil Industry 4.0 goals, SCADA systems must be much more advanced.

Digital and virtual twins are quickly becoming the staple within many industries thanks to the number of benefits they bring to each company. Manufacturing and logistics in particular can benefit from the technologies, thanks to vastly reduced lead times and help when it comes to planning efficiently.

IEC 62443-4-2 host devices are independently evaluated and provide a secure-by-design open platform for industrial automation systems. Installing IIoT software and applications on these host devices creates an IIoT edge computing gateway that meets the industry’s gold standard for cybersecurity.

IEB presents an interview with Hans Beckhoff, Johannes Beckhoff and Martin Rostan of Beckhoff looking back on 20 years of EtherCAT.

Beckhoff hybrid connectors and One Cable Automation has been proven in thousands of field installations. Florian Vogel from I/O Product Management discusses the technical advantages associated with these connectors and the significance of their definition within an IEC standard for decentralized automation.

Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) is a crucial enabler of industrial digitization applications. Numerous industry stakeholders are building TSN-enabled systems to bring the proven benefits of TSN to the factory floor through technological advances and real-world applications.

Industry 4.0 is pushing the boundaries of intelligent automation. Systems solutions are paving the way toward an industrial transformation that promises unprecedented response times along with maximum performance capabilities for motion control.

As industrial Ethernet implementations continue to increase, designers have better choices for higher speeds and factory-friendly form factors. Ethernet is now the preferred industrial networking technology for discrete manufacturing, and it is also advancing in the process industries.

Augmented reality provides a multiplier effect for improving the efficiency and quality of production and inspection processes. The industrial sector can gain effectiveness and efficiency while reducing errors and the additional costs generated, but it does not stop there.

Join us in celebrating 50 years since Bob Metcalfe invented Ethernet technology, but “industrialized” Ethernet is also celebrating its own milestone after passing the quarter century mark. So IEB reached out to industry experts for their perspective on the future of Industrial Ethernet and what to expect moving ahead.