Physical Infrastructure for a Resilient Converged Plantwide Ethernet Architecture

Industrial Ethernet networking is advancing technology applications throughout the plant. These applications are rapidly being deployed from the plant floor to the enterprise. The integration of IT and Industrial Automation and Control System (IACS) Operational Technology (OT) introduces the need for increased security, ease of use, rapid deployment, and network management support. Panduit is collaborating with industry leaders, including Rockwell Automation and Cisco, to provide industry-leading solutions, architectures, and services that help companies reduce risk, enhance operational performance, improve reliability, and successfully implement EtherNet/IP solutions and architectures through:

• Optimized physical network infrastructure solutions from Panduit that have been developed to align with the Cisco and Rockwell Automation “Deploying a Resilient Converged Plantwide Ethernet Architecture” Cisco Validated Design (CVD)
• Design guidance for aligning logical and physical industrial network architectures that utilize industry best practices. Strategic design guidance facilitates effective collaboration between OT and IT
• Integrated solutions, tools, and services to simplify design and implementation for better equipment optimization and broader risk management

Resilient plant-wide network architectures serve a crucial role in achieving overall plant uptime and productivity. The CPwE architecture provides standard network services to the applications, devices, and equipment in modern IACS applications, and integrates them into the wider enterprise network. It also provides design and implementation guidance to achieve the real-time communication and requirements of the IACS as well as the scalability, reliability, and resiliency required by those IACS applications. The CPwE Resiliency Panduit solution can help provide manufacturers the guidance needed to meet the challenges of a fully integrated IACS and realize the business benefits offered by standard networking.