After shrinking significantly during 2001 and 2002, the North American motion control market is bouncing back and will grow at an average rate of 6.2% over the coming five years. That is the conclusion of a new report from the ARC Advisory Group, which predicts that the market will break though the $1bn barrier during this period.

ARC describes the North American GMC (general motion control) market as "vibrant" with new battles brewing over networks, programming languages and architectures. Although the various network protocols are described as "open", they are different and each is supported by a limited number of suppliers. "With the Profibus and Sercos organisations announcing upcoming Ethernet-based solutions," ARC says, "the battle for the standard motion control network is expected to get feisty."

The debate over whether to use centralised or distributed architectures continues. But, ARC points out, the distributed market is growing rapidly because it offers high processing power at a low cost.