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This Position reports to:
R&D Department Lead

The future of industrial control systems is network-based, with standards like OPC UA enabling vendor interoperability. OPC UA includes a publish-subscribe (PubSub) communication model that is increasingly viewed as the future of field-device communication.

Control systems are often deployed in contexts where downtime can have severe consequences. To reduce the probability of downtime, redundant solutions-typically hardware duplication-are used.

This thesis addresses OPC UA PubSub in a redundant setting, focusing on achieving seamless failover, i.e., takeover by a backup upon primary failure.

Your responsibilies

Research and develop a proof-of-concept of integrating redundancy support in a opensource implementation of a communication stack.

Thesis details

The work is divided into three phases, with an optional last phase, which is to write or prepare a scientific publications from the result together with the master thesis supervisors.

Investigation phase

• Familiarize yourself with OPC UA, and OPC UA PubSub in particular
  • Specifications and related work etc.
• Review redundancy concepts
  • Standby redundancy
  • Failover
• Familiarize yourself with open62541, the open-source OPC UA communication stack
• Use one of our earlier works, which identified problems and outlined solution alternatives, as input to propose and discuss different approaches

Design phase

• Based on the investigation, develop a detailed design
• Outline how the design will be integrated into open62541

Proof-of-concept and evaluation

• Integrate the solution into open62541
• Propose and develop an evaluation setup
  • Either based on existing setups that we at ABB, or we develop something simpler for this purpose
• Perform measurements to deduce metrics for properties such as:
  • Recovery time
  • Synchronization limitations (bandwidth, deadlines imposed by the design, etc).
• Optionally evaluate different alternatives (both design and implementation)

Your background

• Master student in computer engineering programs or software engineering
• C/C++ programming experience
• Networking and network experience is desirable
• Embedded system experience
• Understanding of real-time systems

More about us

ABB is a global technology leader in electrification and automation. We see our purpose as being to enable a more sustainable and resource-efficient future. By connecting our engineering and digitalization expertise, we help industries run at high performance, while becoming more efficient, productive and sustainable so they outperform. We call this: 'Engineered to Outrun.'

Positions are filled continuously. Please apply with your CV, academic transcripts, and a cover letter in English. Welcome to apply!

Join us. Be part of the team where progress happens, industries transform, and your work shapes the world. Run What Runs the World.

A Future Opportunity
Please note that this position is part of our talent pipeline and not an active job opening at this time. By applying, you express your interest in future career opportunities with ABB.

We value people from different backgrounds. Could this be your story? Apply today or visit www.abb.com to learn more about us and see the impact of our work across the globe.