Another Ware Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, President: Sho Suzuki) and eSOL Co., Ltd. (Headquarters: Nakano, Tokyo, Japan, President: Katsutoshi Hasegawa), a leading developer of real-time embedded software solutions, today announced the release of OPC UA Toolkit for eSOL, which enables OPC UA Toolkit from Another Ware to run on eSOL's eT-Kernel TRON-based safety-critical real-time operating system (RTOS) as well as on its eMCOS new-generation scalable RTOS for multi-core, multi-processor applications. This simplifies and speeds up the development of client and server software that uses OPC UA both in industry and in water, oil, gas, and other infrastructure applications.

The OPC UA international standard for machine-to-machine communication protocols used in industrial automation is gaining prominence amid the increasingly rapid adoption of the IoT and Industry 4.0 for industrial applications such as FA robots and other industrial machinery. OPC UA enables interoperation between different operating systems (OSs) or equipments from different vendors, providing a reliable means of exchanging data in platform-independent environments without compromising security.

OPC UA Toolkit for eSOL is a software development kit (SDK) for OPC UA developed by Another Ware as part of a technology collaboration with Softing of Germany, a company that has been working with OPC for more than 15 years, supplying a wide range of products and services as a market leader in the OPC technology sector. The SDK significantly shortens development times by enabling the rapid integration of OPC UA connectivity functions into systems that use eSOL's eT-Kernel or eMCOS RTOSes. It facilitates and speeds up the adoption of IoT practices in both new and existing systems while also providing the real-time capabilities and safety performance demanded by industrial and infrastructure applications.

OPC UA Server software in industrial equipment has traditionally run on a conventional OS, and even when a product such as Embedded Linux or Windows Embedded is used, support has only been available for a subset of profiles (such as the Embedded Profile, Micro Profile, or Nano Profile). OPC UA Toolkit with eSOL, in contrast, can satisfy the demands of a wide variety of systems because it also supports the Standard Profile, something that has been increasingly demanded even in industrial applications.

OPC UA Toolkit is an SDK that facilitates the rapid and low-cost development of OPC UA servers using C/C++. It is already in use in a wide range of applications, having been chosen by factory automation and equipment vendors and manufacturers of heavy machinery among others.

eSOL's eT-Kernel TRON-based RTOS and its eMCOS scalable RTOS both have product certification at the highest safety levels (SIL 4 and ASIL D) available under the IEC 61508 standard for the functional safety of electrical/electronic/programmable electronic industrial systems and the ISO 26262 standard for the functional safety of road vehicles. Similarly, eSOL's RTOS development process has been certified as compliant with the IEC 62304 safety standard for medical device software.