Industrial Communications: We Can Communicate and Integrate Everything.
The union between ER-SOFT and LOGITEK completes the range of solutions in the area of Industrial Communications and allows to cover any need in this area: We can communicate and integrate everything.
Legacy Equipment
Let’s start by putting the world of industrial communications in context. Today there is a great diversity of communication media and protocols that coexist in the industrial world: field buses, ethernet networks and wireless communications.
The need to communicate devices that use different protocols within this range of possibilities means that it is not always an easy task: adding communication cards to a PLC may force us to change its programming, affect the execution time or may not even be a feasible solution due to the lack of space in the rack.
This is where the extensive range of solutions to communicate with ER-SOFT’s “legacy” equipment comes into play. The start-up of these equipment is carried out through a simple configuration, without the need for communication cards or programming, so that they allow to respond to several typical scenarios in the industrial world in a very simple way:
- Extend a production line integrating equipment from different manufacturers.
- Migration to Ethernet networks.
- Communication between different field buses (Profibus – Profinet).
- Connect devices to a network.
Wireless Communications
Wireless networks still represent a small percentage, 7%, of the total industrial communications, but they are the ones with the highest annual growth: 25%. This is due to its high efficiency, flexibility and low installation and maintenance costs. In addition, the arrival of the so-called LPWAN (Low Power Wide Area Network) allows the deployment in an extensive area of a large set of devices powered by batteries in a simple and economically viable way. Within this group, we find the LoRaWAN technology that allows the deployment of its own network. In this way, we find two possible scenarios:
- Projects with control and/or real-time communication needs. In this case, WIFI or Bluetooth technology is used depending on the application, distance, etc.
- Projects with monitoring needs: energy efficiency (water, electricity or gas consumption), air conditioning-ventilation systems (temperature, humidity, CO2 level, etc.), occupancy level of a warehouse, etc. These are clear examples of projects where LoRaWAN technology applies.
Building Automation
According to the European Union, buildings are responsible for 40% of energy consumption in Europe. In addition, approximately 75% of the EU building stock is energy inefficient. Therefore, the improvement of energy efficiency of buildings is a priority when reducing consumption and, therefore, operating expenses. This improvement implies investment in new technologies and having smarter buildings that adapt the use of their systems to the real needs of each moment. For this, technologies with specific communication protocols for this environment are used, such as DALI, KNX, BACNET, M-BUS, etc. that are not always easy to integrate with other systems. From ER-SOFT, we have solutions to communicate through all these protocols: sensors, actuators, lighting control, etc.
How to Integrate all this Data?
Up to this point, we have dealt with solutions to collect data from different devices through different communication technologies. However, how is this data integrated into the upper layer systems? This is where the LOGITEK Communication Hub comes into play.
The C-Hub allows to collect process data and integrate it into upper layer systems such as SCADA, ERP, databases, cloud platforms, etc. In addition, it offers a series of functionalities when integrating this data:
- Bidirectional communication, reading and writing capacity on both sides of the communication.
- Scripting, allows to add logic to the communication and contextualize the data in XML, JSON formats, etc.
- Redundancy, self-management of redundancy between two OPC Routers.
- Store & forward, data storage in case of communication failure and subsequent sending upon restoration.
In short, the union between ER-SOFT and LOGITEK completes the range of solutions in the area of Industrial Communications and allows to cover any need in this area: WE CAN COMMUNICATE AND INTEGRATE EVERYTHING.
Do you have problems when communicating with devices present in your production process? Do you need to integrate plant data into your information systems to increase productivity? Get in touch with us and we will advise you on the best way to solve your needs.
