Will SCADA Systems Survive? Or the Future of Distributed Management Systems

IIoT Platforms Vs. SCADA/HMI/MESContemporary SCADA and IIoT platforms have a lot of common features:

• Same data collection protocols

• Identical archive storage methods, while binary storage has gone to the past

• HMIs building is possible in both

• Similar ways of time-series data processing

Obviously, IIoT platforms offer all 4th

generation SCADA features (operation

in the cloud, web visualization, etc.)

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IIoT Platform Advantages As Compared to SCADA

• Solving complex cross-domain tasks (IT infrastructure management, fleet monitoring, service modeling, etc.)

• Collecting and processing not only tags but also structured data (incident tables, service catalogs, arbitrary object hierarchies and connections between them)

• Extensive support for multiple IT (Telnet/SSH, FTP), IoT (MQTT, CoAP), and universal protocols (SOAP, CORBA)

• Complex data visualization (maps, statistical diagrams, data-entry forms, OLAP cubes)

• Operation in publisher/subscriber mode, direct communication between things

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More Than SCADAIoT platforms cover plenty of automation system levels:

• Almost every IIoT platform operates at SCADA/HMI level.

• Most platforms are able to solve MES and OEE tasks.

• Multiple platforms “feel all right” at ERP/EAM levels.

• In some cases, platform components enable SoftPLC level, i.e. logic of controllers and IEC 61131-3 language (FBD, LD, SFC, ST) runtime environment.

• There is a trend towards substituting DSC and niche systems (e.g. AMR).

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IoT Platform Operation at PLC Level

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In Tibbo Project System hardware platform, AggreGate IoT Platform server acts as a runtime environment providing data collection, storage, analysis, and visualization at the controller level, as well as IEC 61131-3 (ST, LD, FBS, SFC) algorithms execution in hard real time.

The server “feels all right” on Raspberry Pi, BeagleBone Black, other single-board and industrial PCs, PLCs with Linux/Windows.

New Business Models• Selling a service, not software, becomes commonplace.

• Paying not for time period/event count, but for the service metrics (running hours, time saved on periodic maintenance, etc.) will gain popularity.

• For setting up a service, a network (“tube”) and a server (“cloud”) are needed. It automatically makes telecoms the first potential IoT service providers.

• As in traditional IT, the value of data ownership in IoT will increase compared to its simple transmission and visualization.

• Investment in device development is decreasing, while investment in platform development is increasing fast.

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Software of the Future Will Be Unified• IoT platforms will take positions currently belonging to various lower

level software.

• The process will remind globalization of ERP systems that should be able to do everything.

• It relates not only to a production sector, but to any other company dealing with physical assets (agroholdings, retail, energy, oil and gas, transport, and telecoms).

• Even in SCADA world, software will be offered as a service.

• Existing niche monitoring and management systems will either transform into global solutions or exit the market.

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