Microsoft Corp. is working with the OPC Foundation to enable virtually any Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) scenario through interoperability between the millions of applications and industrial equipment compliant with the OPC UA standard. Microsoft will enable its IIoT customers to connect a range of manufacturing equipment and software that can span decades of investment with extended support of the OPC UA open-source software stack.
Microsoft’s extended support for OPC UA spans its IoT offerings from local connectivity with Windows devices to cloud connectivity via Microsoft Azure. Integration with Azure IoT allows customers to easily send OPC UA data to the Azure cloud, as well as command and control OPC UA devices remotely from the Azure cloud. In addition, Windows 10 devices running the Universal Windows Platform can connect and openly communicate with other IoT devices via OPC UA.
“As Industry 4.0 reaches a tipping point, we believe openness and interoperability between hardware, software and services will help manufacturers transform how they operate and create solutions that benefit employees’ productivity,” says Sam George, director of Azure IoT at Microsoft. “Microsoft’s support of OPC UA in Azure IoT and Windows IoT will reduce barriers to industrial IoT adoption and deliver immediate value.”
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Tom Burke, president and executive director of the OPC Foundation, added, “OPC UA is widely recognized as a key communication technology for the Industry 4.0 initiative. Microsoft’s support for standards that foster IoT innovation, and specifically for OPC and OPC UA, results in easy, direct and more secure communications from programmable logic controllers on the shop floor to the top-floor world of IT.”
