Industrial networks can be broadly categorized into dedicated/closed industrial networks, open industrial networks, and standard industrial networks. While industrial control networks offer these advantages, their development has lagged far behind that of commercial networks. This is primarily because, in practical applications, connecting enterprise industrial networks requires addressing the following issues:
First, due to the diverse types of equipment in industrial settings and the different industrial communication protocols used, achieving openness and compatibility between them is difficult, making interoperability a major challenge. As enterprise R&D and management extend into the industrial workshop, the integration of IT and OT has become an urgent priority.
Secondly, there are still a large number of "dumb facilities, dumb equipment, and dumb terminals" in industrial sites. Some of these devices may even be outdated and lack data collection capabilities. To promote the in-depth application of the Industrial Internet, enterprises must upgrade these devices to adapt to the needs of intelligent networking.
Third, there are significant differences between IT and OT scenarios in terms of network protocols and data collection. The integration of IT and OT must not only fully consider the differences in network connectivity and data processing requirements between IT business scenarios and OT production scenarios, but also consider the essential support capabilities such as business collaboration and data interaction between the cloud and the edge after the business is moved to the cloud, as well as high network reliability and deterministic latency.
Finally, with the convergence of IT and OT, valuable data from enterprise resources and production management are aggregated on cloud platforms. Cloud computing, big data, the Internet of Things, and mobile office increase the attack surface, making traditional perimeter defenses unsustainable.
To achieve intelligent manufacturing and further deepen the integration and application of technologies such as 5G, AI, and digital twins, the network in production OT scenarios needs to achieve high reliability, deterministic latency, and rapid fault recovery. Through "industrial equipment networking, wireless network access, IP-based factory intranets, and intelligent factory extranets," flexible end-to-end networking between IT and OT can be achieved, constructing an industrial internet network foundation for the intelligent interconnection of everything and enabling data uplink and downlink communication.
The emergence of private 5G networks provides a highly reliable communication guarantee for the transformation of traditional manufacturing towards intelligent manufacturing. A private 5G network is a local area network (LAN) that uses 5G technology to create a dedicated network with unified connectivity, optimized services, and secure communication within a specific area. Private 5G networks also offer enterprises the freedom to customize their networks, providing different configurations based on usage location and work type. They offer significant advantages in privacy and security, enabling dedicated and secure next-generation mobile networks for specific areas and locations such as large factories and industrial parks.
