Systems and methods are provided for enabling coexistence of Information Technology (IT) systems and Operational Technology (OT) systems, where advanced computing functionality realized by the IT systems can be applied to legacy applications and incumbent hardware technologies resident in the OT systems. A distributed control node (DCN) implemented between the IT and OT systems may comprise a microcontroller system partitioned into two processor clusters. Microservices associated with the IT systems are provisioned to a high performance processor cluster, and legacy applications running bare metal associated with the OT systems are provisioned to a real-time processor cluster. Partitioning of the microcontroller system allows for interoperability between the microservices and the legacy applications.