CLPA passes significant milestone as membership passes 3,000
13 October 2017
Spring 2017 has seen the global footprint of CC-Link IE and CC-Link reach a new high, with the number of CC-Link Partner Association (CLPA) member companies passing 3,000.
With this surge in members, of whom more than 300 are offering some 1,700 products available for the technologies, CLPA is helping to drive the digitalisation of manufacturing which is central to the goals of Industry 4.0.
Further, double-digit year-on-year growth has seen the number of installed devices increase from around 17 million in March 2016 to over 19 million at the end of March 2017, and today the installed base is well on the way to passing the 20 million mark.
CLPA-Europe General Manager John Browett comments: “The rate of new installations continues to grow at a double digit pace as more and more users come to appreciate the benefits of our technology. The industry leadership of CC-Link IE has proved to be key, being the first industrial Ethernet technology to provide gigabit transmission rates with full determinism. Given the current move towards Industry 4.0 applications and the bandwidth required for their success, it’s no surprise that its user base is growing so quickly.”
With its roots in Japan, CC-Link IE and its fieldbus counterpart, CC-Link, have long been the de facto networking standards across Asia. But recognition of their key attributes has seen them become an attractive networking option across Europe and the Americas too, with adoption in a variety of industries such as automotive, consumer packaged goods and water. With CC-Link IE offering up to ten times the bandwidth of other protocols, it offers a “future proof” option that supports the rapid increase in process data being generated by manufacturing applications.
This leading bandwidth offers a further benefit to end users and machine builders looking to reduce the total cost of ownership for their systems. CC-Link IE offers the possibility to combine control, motion and safety operations on a single network architecture, meaning that the design, cost and maintenance issues of multiple dedicated networks is now a thing of the past.
Browett concludes: “The growth in members to over 3,000 means that CC-Link IE and CC-Link are continuing to gain market acceptance worldwide. This has been complemented by a steady double digit growth in our installed base globally for about the last decade. Moreover, more companies than ever are developing CC-Link IE or CC-Link compliant devices, with our catalogue now containing around 1,700 different products.
“CLPA has also been leading the way in industry cooperation with a ground-breaking PROFINET interoperability standard developed with PI. We are following this with an initiative to also make CC-Link IE and OPC UA work together as well as a security working group with industry leading members. Combine all these things together and you can see why we are continuing to attract more and more support in the industry.”
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