Making Legacy Automation Part of the Smart Manufacturing Revolution

　　物联网产业（IIoT）是智能制造的关键推动者，或工业4（第四次工业革命），结合大数据来提高生产自动化，减少浪费和能源消耗，提高工厂的灵活性。智能制造和IIoT可以使企业提高生产力的关键绩效指标，设备正常运行和产品质量。公司可能热衷于利用现有的机会，但不太确定如何改变，而不会造成不可接受的中断或浪费他们的投资在现有的设备。目前的机器可以代表一个显着的资本承诺，业主可能不准备从事批发更换，或升级项目，可能涉及重新编程控制器，如PLC。PLC程序可以是复杂的，即使有足够的已知的当前程序的成功修改是可能的，PLC本身可能没有足够的额外资源，以支持额外的功能。

　　Adding Smart to existing facilities

　　To address these concerns， some organizations have explored approaches to introducing web connectivity as an add-on to an existing installation. This can help to lower the cost of entry to smart manufacturing， especially in cases where the installed equipment may contain large numbers of sensors that are used for basic process control. Although rich data may be collected， the lack of external connectivity prevents the organization from realizing its full value.

　　The Industrial Internet Consortium （IIC） has published the Smart Manufacturing Connectivity Testbed， which proposes a solution for extracting data that normally flows through an I/O module to the PLC. This testbed replaces conventional I/O modules with a gateway that sends the data to an IT system through an additional communication channel using the industry-standard OPC Unified Architecture protocol. By using open standards for communication and a common device model， the IIC proposal enables users to configure and manipulate the sensors via the IT system.