Beckhoff expanded the company’s PC Control concept consistently and quickly in the years that followed: Multi-axis NC functions and a complete, integrated software PLC enabled the PC-based Control of highly complex machines and plants.

There have been no fundamental changes to this successful concept since then: the abstraction of the control function from the device hardware and the consistent use of ‘mainstream’ IT technologies converging with the principles of automation technology lead, on the one hand, to continuously improving performance and functionality and, on the other, to cost reductions. The PC Control principle is very simple: a powerful Industrial PC, an equally high-performance fieldbus to which peripheral devices for sensor and actuator systems are connected and control software with real-time capability for logic and motion.

Beckhoff has developed further important products over the last 25 years that are considered as milestones, since they each represent a smaller or larger revolution and have contributed in no small way to the current state of PC-based automation:

• 1989: Lightbus – optical fiber fieldbus for fast I/O coupling
• 1995: Bus Terminals – fine granular I/Os
• 1996: TwinCAT – standard real-time automation software running on Windows
• 2003: EtherCAT – real-time Ethernet for automation
• 2005: TwinSAFE – functional safety in non-safe environments
• 2006: Scientific Automation – measuring technology and engineering science as a control component
• 2008: XFC – eXtreme fast controls for efficient machines and plants
• 2010: TwinCAT 3 – engineering tool and runtime for object-oriented and modular automation

The PC Control technology has found the widest use worldwide: in machine construction and plant engineering, in measurement and testing technology, in wind turbines and photovoltaic production, in office buildings and private houses, in stage technology and on luxury yachts, in medical technology and in particle accelerators… PC Control from Beckhoff is the basis for intelligent, powerful and reliable control technology in all fields.

And the revolution continues, driven by hardware and software advances in IT and automation technology. The Multi-core technology permits the provision of virtually unlimited computing power and new software tools are improving engineering. All automation engineers are called on to use these increases in performance, for example, to control machines, plants and buildings with greater efficiency while using less resources, and in particular to give free rein to their imaginations and to contribute to the future revolutions of the next 25 years.

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