W​​hen people talk about Open Process Automation (OPA), interoperability is often treated as a technical feature — something nice to have once standards mature. In reality, interoperability is not a side benefit of OPA. It is the entire point.

OPA exists because end users reached a hard conclusion: meaningful innovation in industrial automation cannot occur inside closed, single-vendor platforms. It requires ecosystems — and ecosystems only function when components can be substituted, upgraded, and combined without breaking the system.

That is what interoperability enables.

Interoperability vs. “Open” Marketing

Industrial automation vendors have used the word open for years. Often, what that meant in practice was limited openness at the application layer — APIs, scripting environments, or data access — while the underlying architecture remained tightly controlled.

OPA draws a sharp distinction between openness and interoperability.

As ABB explains, the OPA effort is not about inventing new interfaces for their own sake:

“We are developing a standard of standards, driving toward open, secure, and interoperable products.”
— ABB (Why End Users Are Driving the Open Process Automation Standard, ~11:39)

Interoperability means:

• Components from different vendors can work together by design
• Interfaces are defined and verified, not implied
• Substitution is expected, not exceptional

This is a fundamentally different posture from traditional control platforms, where interoperability often stops at data exchange rather than extending to system behavior and lifecycle management.

Why End Users Care So Deeply About Interoperability

For owner/operators, interoperability is not ideological — it is practical.

Julie Smith of DuPont describes the reality many operators face today:

“We’ve got various control systems at our sites from lots of different vendors, different vintages and generations.”
— Julie Smith, DuPont (Why End Users Are Driving the Open Process Automation Standard, ~00:51)

Over time, mergers, acquisitions, and incremental upgrades create heterogeneous environments. Without interoperability, that diversity becomes a liability:

• Specialized staff for each platform
• Inconsistent security postures
• Fragmented upgrade paths
• Limited ability to adopt best-in-class technology

OPA reframes that diversity as a strength — if systems are interoperable.

Interoperability in Practice: The COPA Showcase Example

The COPA Showcase system demonstrates what interoperability looks like when it is taken seriously at the architectural level.

During the showcase, the system integrated 14 different hardware and software components using standards-based APIs and communication protocols.

“We demonstrated interoperability between 14 different software and hardware components using standard-based APIs and communication protocols.”
— COPA Showcase Overview, ~01:25

More importantly, those components were interchangeable.

“I can pull out one of the ACP computers out of this rack and replace it with an alternative vendor — and everything still works.”
— COPA Showcase Overview, ~01:51

That single capability represents a break from decades of automation history. In traditional systems, replacing a core compute element often triggers recertification, reengineering, or wholesale platform migration. In an interoperable system, it becomes a lifecycle decision.

Why Ecosystems Innovate Faster Than Platforms

Interoperability changes who drives innovation.

In proprietary platforms, innovation is gated by:

• A single vendor’s roadmap
• Internal priorities and risk tolerance
• Long release cycles optimized for backward compatibility

In open, interoperable ecosystems, innovation is distributed.

“When IBM introduced the first open PC architecture, the rate of innovation exploded.”

The same pattern occurred with the internet — open protocols enabled entire industries to build on a shared foundation without permission from a central authority.

OPA applies that lesson to industrial control: ecosystems move faster because no single company has to do everything.

Interoperability Enables — But Does Not Eliminate — Accountability

A common concern among operators is that multi-vendor interoperability creates ambiguity: Who do you call when something breaks?

OPA does not pretend this question doesn’t matter. Instead, it separates technical interoperability from operational accountability.

The architecture ensures components can work together predictably. In the Open Process Automation ecosystem control systems integrator are the primary point of contact. The system integrator then works with the appropriate vendors to resolve any issues.

Why Interoperability Unlocks Advanced Capabilities

Interoperability is also the prerequisite for adopting new classes of technology — particularly advanced control, optimization, and AI.

Tom Badgwell explains why traditional DCS architectures constrain technologies like Model Predictive Control (MPC):

“Those architectures limit what you can do with model predictive control… the DCS actually blocks your path down to the I/O.”
— Tom Badgwell, Demo of Open Process Automation, ~21:52

OPA’s interoperable architecture allows advanced algorithms to run where they make the most sense — at the edge, close to the process — without fighting proprietary barriers.

This is not about replacing existing control strategies overnight. It is about creating the option space to evolve them.

What Interoperability Means for Buyers

For end users, interoperability delivers tangible leverage:

• Technology choice
  Select best-of-breed components without committing to a single vendor’s ecosystem.
• Lifecycle flexibility
  Upgrade compute, software, or applications independently.
• Risk reduction
  Avoid being trapped by discontinued product lines or stalled innovation.
• Faster access to value
  Adopt new capabilities when they are ready — not years later.

As Ron Bro of Wind River put it bluntly:

“Open interoperable systems for process automation are inevitable.”
— Ron Bro, Wind River (Why End Users Are Driving the Open Process Automation Standard, ~23:40)

Interoperability Is the Foundation, Not the Finish Line

OPA does not claim that interoperability alone solves every automation challenge. But without it, none of the promised benefits — cybersecurity by design, continuous evolution, ecosystem innovation — are achievable.

Interoperability is the architectural commitment that makes everything else possible.