Universal gateways from MBS equipped with Sparkplug driver

Edge devices for cloud communication in building automation

Krefeld, May 17, 2022 - The versatile universal gateways from MBS now also have a driver for the Sparkplug bus protocol. Since the devices were equipped with an MQTT driver (Message Queue Telemetry Transport) last fall, they are already fit for use in cloud communication. The Sparkplug driver is based on this open source communication protocol and focuses on the Internet of Things and ensuring interoperability. "Property operators who use MQTT but don't want to model the data to be transferred themselves will find Sparkplug to be a suitable solution," explains Nils-Gunnar Fritz, Managing Director of MBS GmbH. "The latest extension to our universal gateways provides the right firmware for this."

Data exchange between different network structures

Sparkplug uses the freedom that MQTT offers building automation and supplements it with the necessary definitions for the direct use of the network protocol. This includes, for example, how devices log into the network and what data they make available. At the same time, Sparkplug defines and uses an economical binary data format, which means that less bandwidth is consumed and data transmission is faster. In addition, communication is managed via a central instance, the primary SCADA/IIoT host. "By using Sparkplug, our gateways act as genuine edge devices for data exchange between different network structures," emphasizes Fritz. "This is a further step for building automation on the way to the Internet of Things."