1. A clustered automation platform, comprising: a plurality of standalone distributed input/output (SDIO) systems having input/output hardware configured for connection to one or more process measurement and control devices; an input/output communication adaptor configured to interface between the plurality of SDIO systems and a standard communication link; a physical local area network architecture configured to interconnect the plurality of SDIO systems with an input/output system processing server and a control processing server; and real-time data distribution system (DDS) middleware configured to interconnect hardware elements of the plurality of SDIO systems, the input/output communication adaptor, the physical local area network architecture, the input/output system processing server, and the control processing server with a virtual local area input/output network, a virtual local area control network, a plurality of virtual control modules hosted by the control processing server, and a plurality of virtual operation areas hosted by the input/output system processing server.