Technologies for facilitating communication between a master programmable logic controller and one or more target drives are disclosed. In an illustrative embodiment, a remote device emulation appliance is configured to receive a communication from a master programmable logic controller that is formatted according to a remote input/output protocol unusable by the target drive. The remote device emulation appliance converts the communication from the remote input/output protocol to a drive protocol usable by the target drive to control operations of the drive and transmits the converted communication to the target drive. The remote device emulation appliance may also convert communications received from the target drive from the drive protocol usable by the target drive to the remote input/output protocol and transmit such converted communications to the master programmable logic controller.