Industrial network equipment maker "MOXA" aims to capture IIoT and DX demand in the Japanese market | Automation Shimbun WEB

MOXA is a Taiwanese industrial network equipment manufacturer and one of the top five manufacturers in the world.

We have a history of more than 30 years as an industrial network equipment manufacturer, and have connected more than 71 million devices in more than 80 countries around the world. It has been supplying products to the Japanese market for more than 20 years, but in line with the full-scale development of industrial IoT and manufacturing DX, it opened a Japanese subsidiary in 2020 and has started full-scale development here.

Japan is an attractive market as a manufacturing powerhouse

Japan is positioned as a focus market for the company. Investment in networks is on the rise due to demand for DX and IoT, and competition among companies for industrial network equipment is intensifying.

According to Charles Cheng, General Manager of MOXA Japan, "Our market share is 30% in Europe, 18% in the United States, and 20% in China, but Japan is only a few percent. Japan has a GDP of 3rd in the world. It is an economic powerhouse with the third largest economy, and the potential is extremely high, making it an attractive market.” As a Japanese corporation, we will first focus on improving MOXA's recognition, support, and services.

Development of IIoT products specialized for industrial use

There are many manufacturers that develop network equipment, and because of the ease of procurement, consumer and business-use network equipment are used as substitutes by users. In some cases, the competition is fierce.

According to Charles, the company's strength is that it specializes in industrial network equipment, while there are many OEM products and products that are made for industrial use by slightly modifying general-purpose equipment for business use. The company specializes in designing, developing and manufacturing for industrial use, which makes a big difference in product quality and reliability. In recent years, there has also been a growing awareness that “data = assets”, and it is said that highly reliable products that meet industrial standards are selected at the site.

Our product portfolio includes switches, routers, wireless LANs, security, IoT gateways, etc., and covers the necessary areas from the field to the edge and the cloud. Although it is a major company, it also supports customization, and "our company's strength is that it specializes as an IIoT connectivity company," says Charles.

There is a high interest in DX and IIoT, and we want to promote them under the initiative of the field, but OT and FA engineers mainly in the production technology department are not familiar with communication networks and IT technology, which is a bottleneck. There are many cases. In response, the company offers a large number of products and tools that can easily build the necessary networks without the need for specialized knowledge or technology.

Focus on TSN, double brand with Mitsubishi Electric

One of the current focus areas is related to "TSN", which is attracting attention as the latest industrial network technology. Started supplying the industrial TSN switch "TSN-G5008 series" to Mitsubishi Electric as a double brand product, and from December 2009, Mitsubishi Electric will supply the "CC-Link IE TSN compatible industrial managed switch model number NZ2MHG-TSNT8F2". Already on sale.

Regarding future developments, Mr. Charles said, "Industrial networks have evolved from M2M 20 years ago to IoT and IIoT. Until now, the Japanese manufacturing industry has introduced new technologies to emphasize reliability. However, as the use of big data and high-mix low-volume production progressed, we began to look at network development in order to increase the facility utilization rate.The communication environment also became high-speed and stable, and big data There is a trend toward MOXA, and we will further increase our recognition in the Japanese market and expand the market for network equipment.”

https://www.moxa.com/jp

https://www.mitsubishielectric.co.jp/