2018 Programmable Controllers Study

The Control Engineering 2018 Programmable Controller Software & Hardware Study unveiled five key findings regarding what end users expect and how they purchase or specify industrial controller software and hardware:

1. Usage of industrial controller software, hardware: Programmable controller software or hardware is most commonly used for continuous manufacturing (24%), discrete and continuous manufacturing (23%), or continuous and batch manufacturing purposes (20%).
2. Applications: Sixty-three percent of end users already use industrial controllers to help with remote monitoring tasks; another 54% use these products for maintenance, 41% for simulations, and 25% as a mobile interface for alarming.
3. Justifications: The top situations in which end users purchase new industrial controller software and/or hardware are an automation upgrade (68%), a new installation (53%), and an operations/engineering upgrade (40%).
4. Cybersecurity: Seventy-one percent of respondents reported that their companies restrict access to controllers in an effort to protect these devices; 55% have increased password protection procedures.
5. Looking ahead: Eighty-two percent of end users expect to buy industrial controller software or hardware in the next 12 months; end users expect to use/purchase an average of 21 industrial controllers during this time frame.

Access the full 2018 Programmable Controller Software & Hardware Report to view additional findings.

The Control Engineering 2018 Programmable Controller Software & Hardware Study is sponsored by AutomationDirect.

Original content can be found at Control Engineering.

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