OPC Foundation allies with FieldComm Group to advance process automation system multi-vendor interoperability

February 19, 2018 - The OPC Foundation and FieldComm Group announced an alliance to advance process automation system multi-vendor interoperability and simplified integration by developing a standardized process automation device information model. 

A joint working group between OPC Foundation and FieldComm Group, tasked with developing a protocol independent companion specification for process automation devices, was formed in late 2017. The goal of the working group is to leverage the experience of FieldComm Group with the HART and FOUNDATION Fieldbus communication protocols to standardize data, information, and methods for all process automation devices through FDI using OPC UA. The OPC UA base information model and companion Device Information (DI) specification will be extended to include the generic definition and information associated with process automation devices. 

The OPC Foundation and FieldComm Group have worked together for over a decade, initially working on the development of the EDDL specification and most recently on the creation of FDI technology.

The joint working group plans to release an extensible, future-proof process automation information model specification during the first quarter of 2019.

Please contact FieldComm Group or the OPC Foundation for information about participation in this joint working group.   The working group is open to all members of both organizations as well as collaboration partners of the organizations.

About FieldComm Group

The FieldComm Group is a global standards-based organization consisting of leading process end users, manufacturers, universities and research organizations that work together to direct the development, incorporation and implementation of new and overlapping technologies and serves as the source for FDI technology. 

About OPC Foundation

The OPC Foundation is a nonprofit international standards organization dedicated to developing and maintaining the best specifications, technology and certification to achieve multivendor, multiplatform, secure information from embedded devices to the cloud. OPC Foundation started in 1995, and the OPC community is grown to over 4200 different companies building OPC products with over 47,000,000 installations. OPC specifications are available without membership and OPC reference implementations are open sourced on GitHub.

About OPC UA

OPC Unified Architecture (OPC UA) is a platform and vendor independent communication technology for a secure and reliable data exchange over the different levels of the automation pyramid. In addition, the information models of the OPC UA standard provide the foundation for a semantic interoperability. 

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