Austrian automation software company COPA-DATA brought its long-held vision of software-defined automation to life at its largest customer event to date, zenonIZE 25.
Held earlier this month at the Salzburg Mozarteum Foundation, the two-day conference drew more than 500 participants from around the world. Themed Composing Tomorrow: Automatize, Digitalize, zenonIZE, the event explored how the convergence of orchestration, digital transformation and open software architectures could redefine industrial automation.
The company, founded in 1987 and still headquartered in Salzburg, used the event to demonstrate the evolution of its zenon platform — a system that integrates automation, control and data orchestration across manufacturing and energy operations.
“zenonIZE 25 featured a rich programme with over 60 speakers, including customers sharing real-world case studies,” said Phillip Werr, Member of the Executive Board at COPA-DATA. The event offered three distinct tracks: manufacturing, energy and engineering workshops. Sessions covered topics from life sciences and process industry automation to virtualisation and interoperability in the energy sector.
A key theme across the conference was the shift away from hardware-dependent control systems towards flexible, software-driven environments. “For decades, the automation industry has envisioned a future where processes are no longer bound to rigid hardware but orchestrated through flexible software platforms,” said Stefan Reuther, also a Member of the Executive Board. “At zenonIZE 25, we showed how our customers can leverage this approach to gain flexibility, resilience and long-term competitiveness in a fast-changing world.”
Reuther described software-defined automation as “moving the automation brain from the hardware into software — decoupling logic from machines to achieve flexibility, speed and openness.” The company showcased technologies such as virtual PLCs, containerised plant-level software, and thin client-based systems hosted on cloud-native operational technology architectures.
Beyond technical discussions, COPA-DATA positioned zenonIZE 25 as a forum for collaboration between customers, partners and industry experts. A networking dinner at St Peter Stiftskulinarium — believed to be Europe’s oldest restaurant — provided a suitably elegant close to the first day’s proceedings.
COPA-DATA, which reported revenues of €99 million in 2024 and employs 450 staff globally, continues to focus on driving digitalisation across the manufacturing and energy sectors. Its zenon platform is used to automate, monitor and optimise systems ranging from production lines to power grids.
“zenonIZE 25 wasn’t just a showcase,” said Werr. “It was a milestone in bringing software-defined automation out of theory and into everyday industrial practice.”
