Softing Industrial Automation has announced the release of "echocollect UA ", a modern, standardized solution for the acquisition and management of process, manufacturing, and quality data via an embedded OPC Unified Architecture (UA) Server.
echocollect UA is designed as a versatile gateway with an OPC UA interface. It independently collects data from programmable controller systems (PLC) and delivers it to a higher-level management system (e.g. ERP or MES) directly via the integrated embedded OPC UA server. While today's customary PC-based solutions require a regular update of the operating system, echocollect UA will work for years virtually maintenance free.
The OPC UA protocol allows simple local and global networking without OPC tunneling and without complicated DCOM configuration, even across firewalls and the Internet.
"We offer our customers maximum flexibility, connectivity and interoperability by enabling them to continue using existing controllers that haven’t been built with 'OPC UA inside'. They virtually upgrade these controllers by using echocollect UA , to support the latest state of the art," says Václav Bouše, Product Manager at Softing Industrial Automation. "For data access, the standardized, open, and platform-independent OPC UA protocol allows the use of different operating systems and devices, regardless of whether the ERP or visualization system is Windows or Linux based, and whether it is running on a mainframe server, a PC, or even a mobile device."
