Community Rules

This is a condensed version of our community rules.

Goal of the community is to develop and market IO-Link as a technology. The IO-Link Community works as a Committee C IO-Link (C) organized within the Profibus Nutzerorganisation e.V. (PNO). The IO-Link interface is in principle to be seen as being independent of the fieldbus systems of the PNO (PROFIBUS and PROFINET).

Membership in the IO-Link Community requires the submission of an application to the IO-Link Support Center, which is located at the PNO, and written acceptance of the supplementary rules. As an IO-Link member you enjoy, in particular, the right to participate in all working groups, early access to all documents and use of the IO-Link patents of member companies as well as free logo use. To bring individual products to the market, there is also the option to acquire a license without becoming a member. Please contact the IO-Link Support Center for this.

Integration into any co-existing bus systems is expressly desired by the IO-Link Community and is actively supported and can therefore be carried out directly through the initiative of the various user organizations.

The most important membership conditions:

  1. A requirement for membership in the IO-Link Community is membership in the PNO e.V. or an associated organization in another country. Irrespective of that, a written acknowledgment of the IO-Link Community rules is required for acceptance (to be obtained from the IO-Link Community Support Center located at Ohiostraße 8, 76149 Karlsruhe, Germany, info@io-link.com).

Rights granted by membership:

  1. Full access to all IO-Link specifications, including work status, fieldbus integration etc.
  2. The right to world-wide marketing of products with the IO-Link figurative marks, as long as the products comply with the specification of IO-Link and are tested according to the test specification using the test tools released by the IO-Link Community (vendor self certification).
  3. The option of working together in technical organizations of the community and the introduction of requirements for expansion and modification of the specifications (via change request through the work server).
  4. Participation in decision making regarding the direction the technology takes (right to make recommendations).
  5. Participation in common marketing activities.
  6. Joint use of patents for IO-Link approved by the member companies.

This represents an excerpt of the supplementary rules. The complete contract text is available in the download area of the IO-Link web page: www.io-link.com