Beckhoff, Bosch Rexroth and Siemens back a shared packaging library

Three heavyweight control vendors — Beckhoff, Bosch Rexroth and Siemens — have announced PackAL, a shared software library for packaging machines.

Competitors agreeing on a common library is notable in a market built on proprietary stacks. For machine builders, it promises reusable, vendor-neutral building blocks for common packaging motion.

If it holds, it chips away at the lock-in that has long made switching control platforms painful — and hints at where open standards could spread next.