Protocol Bridging in IIoT: Translating Between Modbus, EtherNet/IP, and MQTT at the Edge [2026]
· 14 min read
Every manufacturing plant is a polyglot. Modbus RTU on the serial bus. Modbus TCP on the local network. EtherNet/IP talking to Allen-Bradley PLCs. And now someone wants all of that data in the cloud via MQTT.
Protocol bridging at the edge is the unglamorous but critical work that makes IIoT actually function. Get it right, and you have a seamless data pipeline from a 20-year-old Modbus RTU device to a modern cloud analytics platform. Get it wrong, and you have data gaps, crashed connections, and a plant floor that's lost trust in your "smart factory" initiative.
This guide covers the architecture, pitfalls, and hard-won lessons from building protocol bridges that run in production — not just in proof-of-concepts.