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Hirschmann Network
Systems
Distributed
Communication
Architecture
Industrial networking solutions with a
future
Hirschmann Boiler plate.....................................................................................................4
Section 1.............................................................................................................................5
Industrial Communications Systems...............................................................................5
Introduction.........................................................................................................................5
Hirschmann DCA - a strategy for the next millennium ....................................................................5
Strategic direction..............................................................................................................................5
Why do you need a network architecture?.........................................................................................6
Flexibility for the future.....................................................................................................................6
The lack of a single transparent automation and control network.................................................6
The network is a long-term major asset.........................................................................................6
Principles for industrial network architecture..................................................................7
Industry trends....................................................................................................................7
The need for high performance Industrial networks .......................................................9

Ethernet............................................................................................................................................18
Legacy Fieldbus...............................................................................................................................18
COST................................................................................................................................................18
Ethernet............................................................................................................................................18
Legacy Fieldbus...............................................................................................................................18
Section 3...........................................................................................................................19
The Ethernet Evolution..................................................................................................19
A brief history....................................................................................................................21
The road to deterministic Ethernet..................................................................................21
Ethernet developments over the past decade...................................................................................22
Evolving standards............................................................................................................23
Section 4...........................................................................................................................25
A time for change............................................................................................................25
Market dynamics...............................................................................................................25
Vendor opportunities........................................................................................................26
Section 5...........................................................................................................................28
Hirschmann’s DCA........................................................................................................28
A blueprint for future industrial growth.........................................................................28
The Hirschmann Ethernet Fieldbus Approach.................................................................................29
Real-time......................................................................................................................................30
Migration. ..................................................................................................................................30
Topology & Resilience. ...........................................................................................................31
Management. ..............................................................................................................................32
Performance ................................................................................................................................33
Cost. .........................................................................................................................................33
Benefits............................................................................................................................................33
What Hirschmann offers..................................................................................................................33
Summary..........................................................................................................................................34
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operations and a view of configuration/management/diagnostics. Both require traffic
management capabilities in the network to prioritize traffic and minimize congestion,
which DCA provides.
The Scalable Ethernet Architecture (SEA) is a strategic framework for scalable Ethernet
throughout the enterprise, from the workgroup to the enterprise backbone, comprising
advanced network devices and management software.
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Hirschmann Boiler plate
Hirschmann Network Systems, a division of Richard Hirschmann GmbH & co, is the
leading manufacturer of robust system solutions, designed specifically for industrial
networking requirements. Part of Rheinmetall Elektronik AG, the highly successful
German industrial conglomerate, Hirschmann Network Systems have ambitious growth
plans and aim to become the number one supplier of industrial strength networking
solutions within the next
three years. With a broad
spectrum of products,
Hirschmann provides a
complete range of Ethernet
solutions for industrial and
corporate end users.
Customers come from all enterprises, industrial and public sectors, including chemical
and automotive industries, finance and banking, local government, education, the media
and health care. Hirschmann has performed particularly well in harsh industrial
environments where the emphasis is placed on “super-resilient”, deterministic networks.
The industrial product portfolio, IndustrialLine, developed specifically for the challenging
conditions of the industrial world, include maintenance free, long-lived, standards
compliant products that are easily installed within a plug and play architecture. Consisting
of hubs, concentrators and switches,
the IndustrialLine includes four
product families: ASGE, MC, MR

different layers of the current factory floor network is becoming too complex.
Hirschmann solves this dilemma. Instead of viewing factory networks as independent
layers, they are viewed as a single resource for data streams prioritised by application
needs. By viewing factory traffic as layered data streams, it is possible to forward data
using a set of rules that applies to all layers. Instead of compromising between the
different capabilities of the different layers of today's factory network, managers can use
them fully.
Introduction
Most factory floor networks are not ready to take manufacturing into the next millenium.
The DCA product line from Hirschmann provides manufacturers with a practical high-
performance answer with the ability to operate distributed high-bandwidth networks,
delivering unmatched performance through sophisticated robust design
Hirschmann DCA - a strategy for the next millennium
The industry is dominated by legacy fieldbus solutions. So-called fast control networks
generally operate at a meagre 1 or 2Mbps and lack the ability to scale to multi-megabit
speeds and support thousands of devices. Newer fieldbuses like 12Mbps Profibus promise
higher performance, but with an accompanying expensive price-tag. Foundation Fieldbus
are now committed to using 100Mbps Fast Ethernet for the long awaited H2 specification.
Of these alternatives, it is only Fieldbus Foundation with the H2 standard that has the
potential to provide an optimal solution for Industrial automation networks.
This is the market opportunity targeted by Hirschmann's Distributed Communication
Architecture. Designed to meet the demands of the most mission-critical application,
DCA is optimised to deliver the deterministic performance, scalability and high resilience
required by these applications at price-points far below those of today's fieldbus solution.
Hirschmann's Distributed Communication Architecture describes a control network
strategy for the next millennium.
Strategic direction
Simply, Hirschmann's DCA network architecture defines the strategic direction for its
next generation Ethernet fieldbus products - IndustrialLine. The combination of new
demands on the factory floor network and the emergence of the intranet/Internet

architecture justifies the spending of funds.
Network architecture identifies the major components of a network and how they relate to
one another. Since it is strategic in definition, individual components or devices may not
be currently available, but available in a time-scale of about 18 months. In essence, it
defines the ideal state of an actual implementation of a network. However, an architecture
does not specify the exact sizing and placement of its components.
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Principles for industrial network architecture
Although hardware and software implementation differs, the underlying standards for
open, production management systems are the same as can be found in today’s business
systems. That means freedom from the expense of maintaining specialized, one-of-a-kind
systems to run their plants. Further, open systems unchain live manufacturing data,
enabling companies to distribute it freely across enterprise networks in real-time to people
who can use it to make a whole company run more effectively.
Changing manufacturing practices are leading towards a new industrial automation and
control infrastructure. As firms move into the global marketplace and implement
advanced production processes, new technologies - such as Internet, wireless
communications, graphical client/server applications, smart devices and decision support
systems - are being deployed to reduce costs and streamline operations.
However, these new tools and business processes create significant data distribution
problems from the device level to the back office. Companies employing the latest
automation and control techniques can expect a steep rise in bandwidth requirements,
along with multiple challenges as they embrace technology to improve vendors' and
customers' role in production.
Emerging production processes, integrated systems and control/communications
technology offer significant competitive advantages. For many years, the drive in
manufacturing has been towards streamlined operations, improved response time to
production schedule changes and the use of electronics to price and fill orders.
Industry trends
The Internet, and its associated technologies, has radically changed the way people go

The need for high performance Industrial networks
Adding these new processes, systems and technologies to today's automation and control
communication infrastructure will stress it unbearably. Bottlenecks caused by, typically
three, discrete networks (Plant, Control & Device) will need to be removed before
networks become a transparent and plant wide utility.
Over the past five years there have been many enhancements to the Ethernet standards,
especially in areas of determinism, speed and prioritisation. There is no longer any reason
why Ethernet cannot be used to build deterministic fieldbus solutions that are cost-
effective and open. Since Ethernet is already the network choice for business computing,
its presence at the control level will make
sensor to boardroom integration a reality
rather than a goal for manufacturers.
With the physical bottlenecks removed raw transmission speed needs to be increased and
management policies implemented to allow the various traffic types to be prioritised
according to needs.
The initial impact of adding new, bandwidth hungry applications will be on factory floor
network, followed by WANs, should a manufacturer want to make key manufacturing
data available to customers and other partners in its supply chain.
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Distributing manufacturing data is also a bandwidth intensive proposition. Over the next
four years, manufacturing plant information generated by DCS equipment is expected to
increase by 20 or 30 times the current level. Similarly, a 10 or 20 times increase is
expected in PLC equipment collecting information from the factory floor.
Distributed control systems (DCS), Controllers and programmable logic controllers
(PLCs) also eat up bandwidth. These enabling technologies facilitate smart sensors and
devices on the factory floor. Smart sensors mounted on process equipment are now
capable of network connectivity throughout the factory; and each sensor being
individually addressable and intelligent.
Distributed Communication Architecture – DCA
The Hirschmann Distributed Communication Architecture provides suppliers and end

automation network the bandwidth it needs at the level of the network which makes most
sense. Ethernet transmission speeds from 10Mbps to 1000Mbps are all fully standardised.
Cost.
Today, nothing can compare with Ethernet as the lowest cost implementation for a control
network. The ability to take advantage of the existing support infrastructure for Ethernet
is a major benefit to suppliers and dramatically reduces the total cost of ownership. Cost
is also a factor from a development perspective, TCP/IP communications software and the
underlying ASIC chips are commodity, mass market items and priced accordingly.
A blueprint for future industrial network growth
 Greater openness/interoperability with other devices, management software
and control platforms. Hirschmann DCA provides an open communication
architecture compared to legacy control networking and connectivity.
Vendors want openness to reduce client software expense and increase
access to devices and other products.
 Reduced dependence on costly, highly skilled field installation and support
functions - through automatic Internet Web connection and services.
 Greater partnership with end users offering open independent solutions with
superior support services.
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Section 2
An industrial networking architecture for
the next millennium
The demand for ‘open’ industrial communication systems is being driven by end users'
desire to move away from older, centralised plant control strategies to distributed control
in the field. End users want an enabling technology that provides true device inter-
operability, enhanced field-level control, simplified maintenance and reduced installation
costs. The only network architecture capable of delivering against these requirements will
offer deterministic high performance, be standards based and non-vendor specific.
The future of automation
New approaches to process and manufacturing automation, which will have a tremendous

possibly wireless network browser at his or her disposal. In real time, process operators
will be able to monitor and fine tune system performance, access plant information and
communicate directly with their production line managers. These operational online
continuous nodes will be another bandwidth consumer, raising traffic levels significantly.
And the network will not only supply information internally. Trends towards quick-
response, vendor-managed inventory and electronic commerce, are demanding that
manufacturing at the centre of the supply chain be brought online. Customers and
suppliers need to be able to look at all points in the supply chain, from initial order
placement to raw material consumption to assembly to shipment and delivery.
Decision support systems and data warehousing applications will soon be able to "mine"
massive amounts of data for correlation and trends that can lead to operational
improvements. With manufacturing equipment and personnel on the network, higher
management can have access to the operational data on the factory floor in unprecedented
detail.
The new factory floor network will also affect network capacity planning in the same way
as switched networks impacted on traditional shared LAN designs. In future, IT/network
managers will also need to be aware of developments on the factory floor generating
additional traffic which will impact office LANs and servers and, eventually, WAN
traffic. Another way of looking at this is of office users extending their reach towards the
factory floor. Table 1 shows how key business line functions correspond to plant
information sharing and data communication requirements.
Function Information sharing / Data requirements
Operations Detail scheduling Sequencing, priorities, routings, shape, fit, setup,
alternative / overlapping / parallel operations, equipment loading, shift
patterns
Dispatching Production units Flow, jobs, orders, batches, lots,work orders,
Table 1
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