Software-defined networking is a rising technology for handling traffic in large networks. To ensure a high flexibility, software-defined networking separates the control plane from the data plane. The data plane forwards packets while the control plane defines the forwarding rules. In case packets or events need to be processed in a way that is not covered by these rules, the packets or events have to be forwarded to the control plane. This imposes latency to the processing of network traffic and events. This master’s thesis proposes a concept for generic handling of local events in softwaredefined networks, using local data plane applications directly on the switch devices. During this thesis, a concept for local data plane event handling is developed and implementation details are discussed. The evaluation shows that processing of events directly on the data plane improves network performance and saves resources on the switch devices.