The future of industrial networking just got a lot brighter. After a year of uncertainty surrounding the future direction of industrial Ethernet, recent announcements appear to have settled a looming rift in the industrial networking community. In a significant move, the OPC Foundation announced
in late 2018 that it will now actively promote its Publish-Subscribe model for communication with devices at the field level. In addition, time-sensitive
networking (TSN), a mechanism for time synchronization and determinism on Ethernet, is quickly gaining acceptance among industry players. The combination of these two technologies is paving the way for the emergence of a single, universal solution for Ethernet in industrial applications that may one day replace today’s industrial Ethernet solutions.