CODESYS on the Future of Industrial Software Licensing and Virtual PLCs

How will industrial licensing evolve as more value moves from hardware into software? Dieter Hess, CEO of CODESYS, and Stefan Bamberg, Director Sales and Key Account Management at Wibu-Systems, discuss the changing economics and architecture of industrial automation. The conversation explores software monetization, hardware independence, perpetual and feature-on-demand licensing, usage-based models, subscriptions, cloud and network licensing, air-gapped production environments, and the rise of virtual PLCs. As control technology becomes increasingly software-defined and multiple virtual controllers can run on shared infrastructure, licensing takes on a new role: managing not only how software is sold, but also how virtual industrial resources are deployed, counted, and monetized.