Thursday, January 19, 2017

"Elektronik" Interview Discusses Janz Tec's Raspberry Pi System For Industrial Needs


Experiences since the launch in 2015 of the Raspberry Pi Industrial PC


A year ago, industrial systems manufacturer Janz Tec introduced an industrial version Raspberry Pi system. For Janz Tec it was a test to see how the market would respond to such a low-cost system.

What kind of response did you receive to your introduction of an industrial Raspberry Pi at last year's embedded world?
Christoph Mühlenhoff:
A sur­prisingly positive one. We had ex­pected some interest, but not quite so much. And there were not just inquiries - several large projects have developed from it, with quantities up to many hundreds.

And, you are continuing to use the original Raspberry Pi 2 board?
Mühlenhoff:
Yes, but we have now developed our own carrier board to allow the system to be supplied with industry standard 24 Volts instead of a 5V power supply. In addition, it still has a se­rial RS-485/232 interface, a CAN and four digital inputs/outputs onboard. Furthermore, over the last year we have developed a more robust casing. It is still a plastic case, but made from a ma­terial with which we can more eas­ily control EMC problems.

In what kind of projects will the system be applied?
Mühlenhoff:
In industrial proj­ects, but essentially projects where the system is not responsible for critical, fail-safe functions. That means where it does not matter if the system should fail. Thus, not machine control but, for ex­ample, as a gateway or for obser­vation and monitoring of process­es.

When introducing such an in­expensive system the manufac­turer must inevitably face the question of cannibalization of his own products. How would you sum-up af­ter one year?
Mühlenhoff:
 Initially we had con­cerns that we might impede development of our higher priced systems, but the oppo­site has proved to be the case. Our rugged, high-quality industrial systems are control systems, and they cost accordingly. But Rasp­berry-Pi systems are, as such, not used in this area. And there, where they could be used, you might as well buy a system from Taiwan. Thus, we view Raspberry Pi as a door-opener to engage with new customers. If these customers sud­denly develop higher level requirements, we can always meet them with our emPCs - even though they cost a little more.

You offer industrial Raspberry Pi with both Raspbian Linux as well with a customized version of Linux. Is Raspbian sufficient for most customers?
Mühlenhoff:
Yes, well over 90 percent take the Raspbian. We have integrated the device drivers for our additional interfaces in this image. Customers could also do it themselves, but who wants to? - They want to buy it and use it immediately, without having to install any drivers. At this point we have not yet built a genuine, customized image.

Joachim Kroll, Elektronik


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