Brea, CA. Moxa announced it has partnered with Microsoft and the OPC Foundation to develop the MC-1121, an industrial-grade IoT gateway with an integrated OPC UA Publisher module. By using Windows 10 IoT and OPC UA Publisher, the gateway provides an effortless way to get data from field side devices securely and reliably to the cloud for analytics and monitoring through a dashboard. The MC-1121 not only gives system integrators a scalable, flexible solution for their projects, but it also opens up new opportunities and business models for them.
Long used as a method of bridging the OT and IT worlds together, OPC UA is critical for the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), where many devices and systems that use different protocols need to communicate with one another. Originally, OPC UA worked on a client/server model, but when dealing with hundreds or thousands of devices that all need to be interconnected across multiple sites, a more scalable solution was needed. This led to the adoption of the publisher/subscriber model, which allows for more streamlined communication that offers improved scalability and resilience.
Moxa said it has been working closely with the OPC Foundation and Microsoft to adopt the functionality of OPC UA. Moxa hardware is being used for Windows 10 IoT testing, and an OPC UA Starter Kit is being assembled as a collaboration between Moxa, Microsoft, and the OPC Foundation. Moxa will also hold a live demo at the 2017 IoT Expo in Taipei to show how to collect data from various devices and sensors—such as temperature, coolant oil level, and other signals—and send it to Microsoft Azure in the cloud by using the OPC UA Publisher module in Windows 10 IoT.
Cathy Yeh, principal PM of the Microsoft IoT Innovation Center, said, “Industrial IoT projects used to be complicated, requiring connection of a large number of equipment, devices, assets, and sensors. Microsoft is delighted to work with Moxa as an important strategic solution partner to accelerate and simplify networking system deployment by leveraging built-in Azure IoT connectivity.”
Moxa’s MC-1121 Series IIoT gateways deliver device data to the cloud with support for Microsoft’s OPC UA Publisher module, making it easy to get your data into Azure IoT Hub. These IIoT gateways include a variety of interfaces to connect to Ethernet, serial, and I/O devices, and they can be used in conjunction with Microsoft Connected Device Studio.
“The Moxa gateways leveraging OPC UA technology provide the key enabling solution necessary to address information integration between control systems across all industries and the IT world. End users are demanding secure and reliable information integration connectivity, and Moxa’s products truly will facilitate a complete solution connecting the edge with the cloud,” said Thomas J Burke, OPC Foundation president.
Bee Lee, Moxa’s president of global sales and marketing, said, “The Industrial Internet of Things is a paradigm shift, providing businesses with new capabilities such as dashboards that show device status and data in real-time [to enable] on-demand production of customized products. This requires network infrastructure to do much more than before in order to support IIoT applications; it must be even more reliable, more secure, and capable of supporting real-time operations. Moxa’s commitment to versatile, reliable edge-to-cloud connectivity solutions allows us to provide the connectivity necessary to bridge devices to Microsoft’s Azure IoT Hub by using OPC UA protocols, helping cloud and edge work together to help the IIoT reach its full potential.”