| Microsoft operating systems dominate the industrial automation landscape. Automation vendors begin using Microsoft’s COM and DCOM in their product offerings. | 1990s | |
| 1995 | Automation vendors Fisher-Rosemount, Intellution, Opto 22 and Rockwell Software form a task force to develop a standard for data access based on COM and DCOM, and call it OPC, an abbreviation for OLE (Microsoft Object Linking & Embedding) for Process Control. | |
| The task force, established a year earlier, releases version 1.0 of a simplified OPC specification for Data Access (DA) in August. Within the first year, several other software and hardware vendors began using OPC as their mechanism for interoperability. It soon becomes clear that a more formalized organization of compliance, interoperability, certification and validation is necessary. The OPC Foundation is established at the Chicago ISA Show in September. | 1996 | |
| 1998 | The OPC Foundation begins converting its existing specification to web services. | |
| OPC Alarms & Events (OPC AE) specification is released. | 1999 | |
| 2001 | OPC Historical Data Access (OPC HDA), Batch and Security specification are released. | |
| OPC Complex Data, Data eXchange and XML-DA specifications are released.
OPC Unified Architecture (OPC UA), comprising of 13 separate parts, is created by the OPC Foundation. |
2003 | |
| 2004 | OPC Commands specification is released. | |
| OPC UA version 1.0 becomes available. | 2006 | |
| 2007 | OPC Certification Program and Test Labs are introduced. Automation vendors begin offering the first products based on OPC UA. |
|
| OPC UA version 1.01 becomes available. OPC UA for Analyzer Devices (ADI) is released as a companion specification driven by the Pharma and Chemical manufacturing industries. |
2009 | |
| 2010 | The first embedded OPC UA devices are released. OPC UA for IEC 61131 is released as a companion specification. |
|
| IEC 62541 is released (UA). | 2012 | |
| 2013 | OPC UA 1.02 is released. OPC UA for ISA-95 is released. OPC UA for Devices 1.01 is released. The OPC Foundation supports over 480 members across China, Europe, Japan and North America. |
|
| OPC UA v1.03 released IEC 62541:2015 Version releasedIndustrie4.0 reference architecture Modell (RAMI4.0) is listing OPC UA for communication layer VDMA set goal to develop standardized Information models for Factory Automation with OPC UA |
2015 | |
| 2016 | OPC Lab in Europe establishedAutoId companion specification for identification devices like barcode, OCR, 2D code, RFID, NFC, RTLS, sensors and mobile computing PLC FunctionBlocks for OPC UA based controller-controller communication The OPC Foundation supports over 490 members across China, Europe, Japan and North America. |
|
| MDIS companion specification: Oil and Gas standard for interfacing the Subsea Production Control System CNC companion specification for interfacing Computerized Numerical Control Systems FDI companion specification for host systems that manage field devices during their entire LifeCycle VDMA published “Industrie4.0 Communication Guildeline based on OPC UA” |
2017 | |
| 2018 | OPC UA v1.04 released
Total of 18 companion specifications released including specifications for Energy Automation (based on IEC61850), Tobacco industry, multiple fieldbus mappings, PackML, AutomationML About 20 working groups developing further OPC UA companion specifications for additional machines or Industries The OPC Foundation supports over 636 members across China, Europe, Japan and North America. |
