Beckhoff Automation

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Beckhoff Automation

logo
legal form GmbH & Co. KG
founding 1980
Seat Verl , Gütersloh district , Germany
management Hans Beckhoff
Number of employees 4350
sales EUR 903 million (2019)
Branch Electrical industry
Website www.beckhoff.de

The Beckhoff Automation GmbH & Co. KG is a manufacturer of automation technology based in East Westphalia Verl and part of the Beckhoff Group . Beckhoff Automation implements automation systems for industry and building automation. An essential feature of the systems is the use of PC-based control technology, which is developed on the basis of open PC and IT standards. Beckhoff is the initiator of the real-time Ethernet EtherCAT .

Until 2005 the company operated under the name Beckhoff Industrie Elektronik .

Company history

Beckhoff Automation was founded in 1980 by Hans Beckhoff. The origins of the company go back to 1953, when Arnold and Elisabeth Beckhoff founded the company "Beckhoff" in Verl , East Westphalia . Beckhoff Automation operated under the name Beckhoff Industrie Elektronik until 2005 . Beckhoff Automation, like the other companies in the Beckhoff Group , is still run as a family company to this day.

Key figures

Beckhoff Automation achieved sales of 903 million euros in 2019. The company employs 4,350 people worldwide. The company headquarters are still in Verl , Gütersloh district . Beckhoff has 23 branches in Germany; the company is represented worldwide by 39 subsidiaries and a total of over 75 agencies.

The company occupies top places in various business rankings. In January 2015, WirtschaftsWoche listed Beckhoff Automation in 6th place in the world market leader ranking "The 30 best of German medium-sized companies". On December 13, 2015, the newspaper DIE WELT published the results of the study “Top 100 - Ranking of medium-sized companies 2015 - growth and earnings stars from Germany” by the Munich Strategy Group, in which Beckhoff Automation ranks 7th (out of 3500 companies analyzed).

Field of activity

The company offers system solutions and individual components for controlling machines, plants and buildings. The control technology from Beckhoff is based on open PC and IT standards. Some of the products and technologies developed by Beckhoff Automation have achieved global market significance. This includes the electronic “ Bus Terminal ” terminal block, the TwinCAT automation software and the real-time industrial Ethernet system EtherCAT . The EtherCAT protocol has been an IEC standard since 2005 . The user organization EtherCAT Technology Group is the world's largest fieldbus user organization in terms of membership.

Research and Development

The company continuously invests in the research and development of new products and technologies. As a core company, Beckhoff supports the technology network "Intelligent Technical Systems OstWestfalenLippe" ( it's OWL ), which was recognized as a top cluster by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) as part of the federal government's high-tech strategy and develops solutions for Industry 4.0 .

Products

The Beckhoff Automation GmbH & Co. KG product range is divided into four areas:

IPC

Embedded PC Embedded PC CX1020 from Beckhoff

The "IPC" segment includes industrial PCs and Embedded PCs . The industrial PC portfolio consists of built-in and support arm Panel PCs, control cabinet industrial PCs and control panels. Different form factors and display sizes are available. A unique selling point of Beckhoff Industrial PCs are the motherboards that Beckhoff develops and produces in-house in Westphalia. PCs with 3½ inch motherboards and ATX motherboards are manufactured. With the Embedded PC product line, Beckhoff sells modular Industrial PCs that can be mounted directly on the top-hat rail in the control cabinet. The Embedded PCs are very compact and have a connection surface for Bus Terminals or EtherCAT Terminals on the right.

I / O

Beckhoff Automation summarizes its fieldbus components under "I / O" (input / output). These include the IP 20 I / O systems EtherCAT Terminals and Bus Terminals , the IP 67 systems EtherCAT Box and Fieldbus Box, as well as infrastructure components such as fieldbus cards, switches and EtherCAT distributors and converters. In addition to the in-house EtherCAT fieldbus system , the I / O systems from Beckhoff Automation support a large number of other fieldbus systems , including Profibus , Profinet , EtherNet / IP, DeviceNet and CANopen .

Motion

In the "Motion" area, the product range consists of servo amplifiers, servomotors , linear motors , stepper motors and planetary gears . With One Cable Technology (OCT), Beckhoff has launched the one-cable connection for servomotors on the market.

The eXtended Transport System (XTS) developed by Beckhoff is an innovation in drive technology. This is a linear motor on which a variable number of movers can move independently of one another in an endless loop.

Automation

Beckhoff Automation bundles all software products and system solutions under the term "Automation". The core product is the TwinCAT automation software. The TwinCAT 3 version was integrated by Beckhoff into the Microsoft Visual Studio development environment. This means that Visual Studio can be used for automation and application programming, while at the same time the user has a large number of programming languages ​​available. In addition to the classic PLC programming according to IEC 61131-3, programming can optionally be done in C / C ++. A connection to Matlab / Simulink is also integrated in the software.

The TwinSAFE safety solution integrates safety-relevant sensors and actuators into the machine control. The signal is transmitted via the standard fieldbus system, there is no separate safety circuit.

With the eXtreme Fast Control Technology (XFC) Beckhoff offers a control solution in which the I / O response time is <100 µs. This enables sampling rates of up to 10,000 times per second, which enables particularly precise, material and energy-saving production.

It's OWL

Beckhoff is one of 27 core companies in the BMBF top cluster "Intelligent Technical Systems OstWestfalenLippe ( it's OWL )"

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Beckhoff Group: Company history. (No longer available online.) Elektro Beckhoff GmbH, archived from the original on May 2, 2014 ; Retrieved April 25, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.elektro-beckhoff.de
  2. ↑ Beckhoff Automation. Beckhoff Automation GmbH & Co. KG, accessed on April 29, 2019 .
  3. ↑ Champions of German SMEs: The New Strategies of World Market Leaders. WirtschaftsWoche, accessed on December 29, 2015 .
  4. ↑ Top 100: These are the real stars of the German economy. DIE WELT, accessed on December 29, 2015 .
  5. ↑ Elektro Automation: 25 years of PC-based control technology. (No longer available online.) Konradin Verlag, archived from the original on May 2, 2014 ; Retrieved April 15, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.wirautomatisierer.de
  6. ↑ EtherCAT Technology Group. EtherCAT Technology Group, accessed April 30, 2014 .
  7. ↑ it's OWL technology network - Beckhoff Automation. Intelligent Technical Systems OstWestfalenLippe, accessed on April 30, 2014 .
  8. ↑ Electronics practice: Own motherboard and bios development in Westphalia. Vogel Verlag, accessed on May 15, 2014 .
  9. ↑ Elektroniknet: Second generation of modular Embedded PCs. WEKA Fachmedien, accessed on May 15, 2014 .
  10. ↑ Beckhoff Bus Terminals: The extensive I / O system. SPS-Magazin, accessed on May 13, 2014 .
  11. ↑ BECKHOFF New Automation Technology. Retrieved January 22, 2017 .
  12. ↑ One- cable solution for highly dynamic servomotors. (No longer available online.) Konradin-Verlag, archived from the original on May 17, 2014 ; accessed on May 14, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.wirautomatisierer.de
  13. ↑ Drive technology rethought. etz elektrotechnik & automation, VDE Verlag, accessed on May 12, 2014 .
  14. ↑ Visual Studio 2010 for embedded automation with TwinCat 3 from Beckhoff. msdn - Visual Studio News, Microsoft Cooperation, accessed May 15, 2014 .
  15. ↑ XFC - eXtreme Fast Control Technology: Beckhoff presents extremely fast automation system. SPS-Magazin, accessed on May 15, 2014 .
  16. ↑ It's OWL (core) company. Retrieved March 30, 2020 .

Coordinates: 51 ° 52 ′ 44.5 "  N , 8 ° 28 ′ 21.9"  E