Hannover Fair 2004: Modbus protocol ownership moved to Modbus-IDA

Hannover, Germany - To show how dedicated it is to the openness of the Modbus protocol, Schneider Electric recently transferred its copyright of the protocol to Modbus-IDA, a nonprofit organization formed in 2002 to advance industrial communications. Modbus was originally de-veloped by Modicon, which became part of Schneider Automation in 1979.

The agreement, signed by Schneider Automation Inc. and Ken Crater, Modbus-IDA’s president on April 12, moves ownership of the protocol to the organization. This transfer includes the entire “right, title and interest” in the protocol copyright. It was publicly announced at the Hannover Fasir 2004, April 19-24, at the Hannover Fairgrounds.

“This transfer establishes a milestone in the inevitable migration of our industry toward open protocols,” says Crater. “It’s only fitting that the most widely implemented protocol on the industrial landscape is now in the hands of a nonprofit organization committed to its further proliferation and evolution.” Crater announced the organization’s intention to pursue international standardization for the protocol in the near future.

Jean-Jacques Poubeau, Schneider’s VP, adds that, “By transferring the Modbus protocol rights to Modbus-IDA, a non profit and independent organization, Schneider Electric demonstrates its willingness to move toward really open systems and architectures based on open standards and vendor-independent protocols. The association of Modbus protocol with a standard Ethernet TCP-IP stack makes available the first really open and vendor independent Industrial Ethernet solution.”

For more information, visit www.modbus-ida.org.

Control Engineering Daily News Desk
Jim Montague, news editor
jmontague@reedsbusiness.com

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