PROFINET V2.5 – A significant step toward the future

For over two decades, the PROFINET specification has been continuously developed to meet the growing demands of industry and open up new technological possibilities. Its widespread use in a wide variety of industries and its sustained market success underscore the innovative strength and future viability of PROFINET. Backward compatibility has always been a priority in order to protect existing investments.

With the new version V2.5, PI (PROFIBUS & PROFINET International) marks another innovative milestone in specification development. This was based on numerous technical and organizational contributions within the PI organization as well as intensive coordination with international committees and associations.

The long-standing cooperation between IEC and IEEE within the framework of the IEC/IEEE 60802 standard has reached a decisive milestone with the first official specification. PI has actively participated in this process and contributed decisive domain knowledge – in particular on practicable real-time communication with simultaneous parallel TCP/IP traffic. As a result, PROFINET can be optimally integrated into 60802-based networks and supports the desired IT/OT convergence.

Decisive progress has also been made in the area of cyber security: the original conceptual approaches have been translated into concrete specifications. Security Class 1 (SecCl1) devices are already in use, and Class 2 and 3 functions are currently being tested. With V2.5, the last outstanding issues—including certificate distribution—have now been resolved, meaning that PROFINET can be described as "security inside" in the future.

A newly defined transport channel enables the secure and flexible implementation of use cases such as parameterization, tool access, or firmware updates—with or without security. This is a significant step toward further modernization and simplification of PROFINET. Thanks to clear layer separation, this channel is suitable for both highly optimized embedded systems and virtualized, container-based environments. 

In addition, the latest enhancements for the integration of Ethernet APL and Single Pair Ethernet (SPE) have been added. All these innovations are also reflected in the updated GSD/GSDX specifications and will be transferred to PI's proven test systems as usual.

With PROFINET V2.5, the PI organization is actively shaping the future of industrial communication. The integration of innovative technologies into standardization is the key to scalable, cost-effective solutions and opens up new possibilities for IT/OT convergence, cyber security, and networking. PROFINET thus creates the basis for a networked, secure, and future-oriented industry.