IPC to Develop New Shop Floor Communication Standard

The proliferation of IIoT devices and the need to connect shop-floor machines has prompted IPC to go beyond its shop-floor standard, IPC-2541, and create a forward-looking communications standard. IPC’s Shop Floor Communications Subcommittee brought together leading software developers, machine vendors, assembly equipment manufacturers, and their customers to work on developing “a new IPC standard to meet the current and future needs of industry that will fill a gap identified by the group,” according to a recent IPC statement. The new standard aims to provide uniformity of data protocols to allow easy machine-to-machine communication.

The increased need for machine-to-machine communication has prompted IPC to work on a new shop-floor communication standard that will go beyond IPC-2541.
(Source: IPC)

David Bergman, IPC vice president of standards and training, noted that machine vendors want to engage quickly. “All parties have agreed we need to replace IPC-2541 (Generic Requirements for Electronics Manufacturing Shop-Floor Equipment Communication Messages, or CAMX),” he told Design News. The new standard aims to be industry-wide. “The CAMX standard has not proved to be effective. Companies are motived to move toward industry 4.0 across the industry not just within a company.”

During a March 16 meeting at IPC’s Apex Expo, two commercial initiatives were presented, and based on those two presentations, it became clear that several licensing and intellectual property issues need to be resolved before the new standard can progress. “At the meeting, there were two proposals. Once we have a consensus on the process, we’ll move forward,” Bergman told us. “We need to get a critical mass of companies to get to a usable standard.”

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The Expectation for Machine Connectivity

The need for a new standard was illustrated by the ubiquitous attendance by machine manufacturers at the meeting. “We had a significant majority of the equipment suppliers in the industry. They came to IPC and they asked to work together on an equipment-to-equipment information standard,” said Bergman. “Everyone says they want to work together, so there must be external pressure.”

That external pressure is clearly coming from customers who want machines that can easily connect. In the past, individual machine producers used proprietary communication protocols. Customers want to move beyond proprietary protocols. “Everyone is falling over themselves to say we have 4.0 communications, and the customers want everybody’s machines to talk to everybody else’s machines.”

New Standards Welcomed by Machine Producers

IPC was planning to develop the standard before they found out how receptive the machine builders would be. “We had been working to put this meeting together for six to eight months knowing we needed to do this by directional sharing,” said Nancy Jester, design process manager at IPC. “This meeting was happening no matter what, but the outpouring from the equipment community was incredible and that will help us to get this moving forward.”

To facilitate the process, IPC seeks to include all shareholders interested in machine-to-machine communications. “Right now we’re meeting every other week to make sure we get our ducks in a row. We want to make sure we have representatives from software companies to equipment manufacturers to OEMs,” said Jester. “Then we’ll get some basic milestones in place. If the legal issues get cleared up, this will start faster. If we have to start with a blank sheet of paper, it will take longer. Either way, within a month we’ll have monthly meetings.”

Rob Spiegel has covered automation and control for 15 years, 12 of them for Design News. Other topics he has covered include supply chain technology, alternative energy, and cyber security. For 10 years he was owner and publisher of the food magazine Chile Pepper.