More Ethernet for industrial distributed/remote I/O use
Staff -- Control Engineering, 10/1/2006
Vendors of distributed/remote I/O and fieldbus organizations will step up the development of application protocols based on core layers of Ethernet now that the worldwide market for Ethernet-based buses and networks is forecast to grow at an annual rate of 13.3% through 2010. That rate compares to the overall industrial distributed/remote I/O market growth rate of 5.9% for the same period. The study from Venture Development Corp. (VDC) also reported that Ethernet-based buses/networks comprised 15% of worldwide distributed/remote I/O shipments in 2005 and forecast it to be over 20% by 2010. Current & forecast worldwide shipment shares of distributed/remote I/O with Ethernet connectivity (percent of dollar volumes):
- 2005 Total: $3,188.8 million; Non-Ethernet-based buses/ networks: 85.3%; Ethernet-based buses/ networks: 14.7%; and,
- 2010 Total: $4,256.5 million; Non-Ethernet-based buses/ networks: 79.4%; Ethernet-based buses/ networks: 20.6%.
Ethernet offers advantages over industrial fieldbuses, VDC says, including easy integration with office IT, high bandwidth and large data packets, low cost, and remote configuration.
Vendors of distributed/remote I/O systems and fieldbus organizations have taken steps to develop application layer protocols that operate on the core layers of Ethernet.
Largest 2005 worldwide distributed/remote I/O market shares with dedicated Ethernet-based bus/network application layer protocols were Modbus TCP, Ethernet/IP and Profinet.
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