EtherCAT: Almost 60 million nodes and exponential growth
June 2023
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
For the first time since EtherCAT was introduced 20 years ago, the EtherCAT Technology Group (ETG) is publishing node figures. Excluding modular I/O devices, ETG counts 59,1 million nodes, with recent growth being particularly impressive. Since 2014, growth has been exponential, with 18,4 million nodes added in 2022 alone.
These figures include EtherCAT chips sold in a respective year, though this does not include the chips for Bus Terminals. Thus a modular I/O station counts as a single node, even if it consists of many more EtherCAT bus terminals. “The chip numbers are accurate figures, but there is a certain time lag: not every chip becomes an installed EtherCAT device in the same calendar year,” comments Martin Rostan, executive director of the EtherCAT Technology Group.
Martin Rostan is also in charge of all EtherCAT licensing on behalf of Beckhoff Automation. EtherCAT, similar to CAN, requires only that the chip manufacturer licenses its hardware, the cost of which is included in the purchase of the EtherCAT chips. Beckhoff Automation finances the EtherCAT Technology Group with the chip licence income, and membership in the world’s largest fieldbus association is free of charge.
“Because we don’t know the exact unit numbers of FPGA IP core-based implementations, we have held back on publishing node numbers so far,” says Martin Rostan. “But the reported unit numbers of the current 12 EtherCAT chip vendors are now so large that any possible fuzziness in estimating FPGA numbers is no longer a factor. They enter the totals at less than 10%. We have also included multiprotocol chips in proportion to the market share of the protocols. On the one hand, the figures are based on very reliable sources, and on the other hand, they are determined very conservatively. There are probably significantly more EtherCAT devices.”
Except for 2019, where EtherCAT unit numbers were also unable to escape the sideways trend of the automation market, growth has been exponential for several years. “Three years ago, we still believed in an upward outlier, but now the trend has solidified − the exponential growth continues,” continues Rostan. “The Asian market is developing the fastest, especially China. But EtherCAT is also making better and better progress in North America. And in Europe, where EtherCAT has its origins, EtherCAT has been going strong for quite some time.”
For more information contact EtherCAT Technology Group, +49 911 540 56226, [email protected], www.ethercat.org/press
Further reading:
EtherCAT interoperability removes industrial networking barriers
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
Selecting the right communication technology is one of the most important decisions engineers make, and interoperability helps with that decision. Key development tools and standards ensure interoperability among many EtherCAT devices and manufacturers.
Read more...
Condition monitoring to go
Turck Banner Southern Africa
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
Anyone who wants to efficiently monitor the climate in control cabinets will find a comprehensive range of control cabinet monitors for the DIN rail in Turck Banner’s cabinet condition monitoring family.
Read more...
Affordable building management system product range
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
Schneider Electric has unveiled its EasyLogic Building Management System range, designed for basic building architectures, to the local marketplace. This is a complete and cost-effective range of field controllers and sensors that are both easy to install and scalable.
Read more...
Flexible EtherCAT communication interface for DALI-2
Beckhoff Automation
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
The EL6821 EtherCAT Terminal from Beckhoff allows up to 64 DALI/DALI-2 slaves and 64 DALI-2 input devices to be connected. The TwinCAT 3 System Manager makes it easy to configure and parameterise DALI devices flexibly.
Read more...
EtherCAT-based control technology for building automation
Beckhoff Automation
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
Modern non-residential buildings place many high demands on building automation. This can be optimally implemented with EtherCAT-based control technology from Beckhoff, which provides an efficient central automation architecture thanks to ultra-fast data communication.
Read more...
PC-based control for university studies
Beckhoff Automation
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
The IDEA box developed at Heilbronn University of Applied Sciences is designed to introduce students to the topic of Industry 4.0 in a simple and practical way. At the core of the corresponding demo case is PC-based control from Beckhoff.
Read more...
A new standard in high-speed Ethernet communication
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
The TXMC897 module from TEWS Technologies supports a range of Ethernet standards and speeds, making it suitable for diverse applications, including the defence, industrial, and IIoT markets.
Read more...
Data-driven battery production
Turck Banner Southern Africa
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
The availability of high-performance batteries at moderate prices is one of the most important factors for the success of electromobility. As a long-standing automation partner to the automotive industry, Turck Banner supports the major battery manufacturers with its know-how.
Read more...
Bring critical temperature data to your condition monitoring system
Turck Banner Southern Africa
Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
Data conversion just got easier. Turck Banner converters are compact, simple add-ons that seamlessly fit into your factory applications. You can take various types of signals such as discrete, analogue and many others, and convert them to protocols like IO-link, PICK-IQ, PWM/PFM, and Modbus.
Read more...
Case History 190: Measurement problem ruins level control.
Michael Brown Control Engineering
Editor's Choice Fieldbus & Industrial Networking
The widely held belief in many plants that tuning will solve all base layer control problems is completely fallacious. Bad tuning is generally not the main reason for loops to perform badly. It is important when performing optimisation that all elements in a loop are considered, in addition to the control strategy, before even thinking of tuning.
Read more...
printer friendly version