Controller of Controllers Architecture for Management of Heterogeneous Industrial Networks

Increasing heterogeneity of industrial network systems is a fact and the chances that in the future one communication standard will be able to fulfill the requirements of all possible applications are utopian. With the increasing number of communication systems, their management, configuration, and maintenance become a significant issue. Additionally, due to the increasing amount of network services and traffic, the management of available network resources and the possibility of delivering certain levels of communication quality of service, especially across different network solutions becomes a big challenge. Therefore, in this paper a Controller of Controllers (CoC) concept for management of heterogeneous industrial networks is proposed. The concept is designed to support still widely spread legacy fieldbus systems, different Ethernet-based industrial solutions, and potentially upcoming network technologies. The goal is achieved by leveraging state-of-the-art architectural concepts such as software-defined networks, which allows for integration of abstract models in network management. The concept is described and discussed by way of a demonstrator concept for a heterogeneous system of fieldbus and Ethernet-based time-sensitive networks.