PCI industrial computer manufacturers group (PICMG)

The PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group (PICMG) is a non-profit organization founded in 1994. It is responsible for all PCI-based standards that have found their way into both office technology and industrial computers.

In the early years, PICMG developed the PCI/ ISA standard, which allowed manufacturers of PC-based systems to use both bus systems that were prevalent at the time. One example of this is the PICMG board, which combines both bus systems.

In industrial applications and telecommunications, passive backplanes are more suitable than monolithic motherboards. This is due to the flexibility and modularity required for industrial applications. That is why a PICMG standard has been defined in the form of CompactPCI, which is ideal for embedded systems and high-end applications. However, with the form factor of the Eurocard, compatibility with inexpensive standard PCI components was lost.

In addition to Compact PCI, PICMG has also defined a standard for embedded systems and embedded PCs: Embedded PCI-X or ePCI-X or ePCI.