RTU stands for Remote Terminal Unit, sometimes also called Remote Telemetry Unit or Remote Telecontrol Unit. A RTU is a microprocessor based device that monitors and controls field devices, that then connects to plant control or SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) systems. If you do a search on the definition of a RTU, you may find many results that state a RTU is much more powerful than a PLC as the RTU can have several inputs and outputs. Well, as you know, so can the PLC. The RTU does have some potential benefits over the PLC.
