One HMI for (almost) all applications

piaOperate has continuously evolved at the PIA site in Amberg for more than 15 years and is being used in hundreds of machines. Today, it is a freely configurable interface for all types of machines and is standard equipment in all Beckhoff based automated machines. It is operated via a tablet using different swiping motions.

piaOperate offers two possibilities of designing a machine interface/ HMI: standardized windows and individual pages. Standardized windows are simply “activated” in the configuration and don’t need to be reprogrammed while individual pages (“scripting engine”) allow the engineers to take individual customer requests into account. Typical standards are the display of messages/ faults, the management of type and machine parameters, serial fault management and the visualization of cycle times and real time counters. Additionally, it offers printable logs that provide information on days, shifts, orders or parts produced. An OEE module and a shift management section round the system off. Depending on the machine, there are a number of additional modules that customers can purchase, e.g. machine downtime analysis and parameter change history.

piaOperate is sold through a licensing model as a modular system. If the customer requests further functions they usually “only” have to activate them thanks to standardized interfaces. This results in savings when compared to competitor products. Configuring an HMI for a medium-sized automated machine only takes one day.