The success of the technology is based on a number of factors: The application of open mainstream computer technology enables countless existing solutions to be used and customer- or application-specific automation solutions to be implemented relatively easily. The use of an industrial standard, which by now should really be regarded as part of the world cultural heritage, ensures worldwide acceptance. The option of utilizing continuously increasing computing capacity for mastering more and more demanding tasks enables even the most complex tasks to be handled. Beckhoff links these factors with a business model based on state-of-the-art technology, continuity in entrepreneurial actions, and down-to-earth system responsibility. Beckhoff also combines decades of experience in the application of PC-based automation systems with continuous expansion of our global presence.

Furthermore, this former niche approach not only has the potential of continuously developing into mainstream technology, but it can also significantly widen the limits of automation applications and offer companies and individuals interesting new growth prospects.

The very high processor power that is now available enables the extension of control applications into areas with 100 µs task times and similar response times – this alone offers rather exciting options. In general, the kind of computing capacity available today enables automation functionalities to be implemented purely in software. With appropriate structuring, this approach enables abstraction of the functionality from the underlying hardware and minimization of the dependencies on special hardware, which can be reduced to generic elements (e.g. IPC, I/O and drives). With the correct application of Ethernet technologies for I/O tasks, communication times and associated jitter can largely be eliminated, so that the boundaries between distributed I/O and fast “board level I/O” start to disappear. This enables automation technology to expand into regions which previously had to be laboriously built around automation, e.g. measurement technology. The application itself can now go beyond sequence and motion: Familiar tools are available to system integrators in a variety of engineering systems, which now all feature a PC-compatible variant: In practice, there are hardly any sensors or measuring techniques for physical parameters or software packages that cannot be used via PC. Open PC technology is therefore fundamentally a platform for integrating the know-how of both machine manufacturers (OEMs) and end users in a free software form without having to disclose this know-how to third parties. The automation process can be regarded as a sequential logical process up to even a mathematical model. It can be expanded with measuring and maintenance technology and can be built using a variety of tools.

This characteristic of the open “New Automation Technology” enables automation to be linked with adjacent disciplines and opens up new areas of application for automation companies. Users will gladly support this development of “merging technologies”, as a result of which they will be able to master their processes fully and more comprehensively than ever before through a suitable software system, without being too dependent on hardware. These systems with closer links and shorter cycle times will lead to significant further increases in “quality” and performance of automation.

This immanent ability to be able to penetrate, in principle, any technological area worldwide with an accepted hardware and software platform and to offer users the opportunity to concentrate on implementing their process know-how makes new automation technology more exciting than ever.