THE MARKET FOR PCB LAYOUT TOOLS IS STAGNANT
MYTH OR REALITY?

By Wolfram Blume
President and Founder
MicroSim Corporation
Irvine, California

It is common knowledge that the market for printed circuit board (PCB)
layout tools is stagnant. Although a myriad of PCB products are available
from many EDA vendors, the total sales growth of these tools is quite
modest. 

Any electronic design automation (EDA) vendor that makes a big investment
to create a PCB layout tool and bring it to this crowded market is
seriously misguided, right? 

Although the above facts sound right, the conclusion that the PCB layout
market is immobilized isn't the true story. 

Today's design methods will undergo significant changes over the next three
years, especially the relation between "front-end" design (computer aided
engineering, or CAE) and "back-end" layout (computer aided design, or
CAD). 

The design flow as practiced today has built a solid fence between CAE and
CAD work. The CAE work is done by an engineer with an electronics
background, usually with an EE degree. The CAD work is done by a designer
with a layout and manufacturing background. Often they even have different
management hierarchies. The interface between the two groups is the
schematic, which is "thrown over the fence," often with paper as the
medium.

There are two strong, competitive advantages to removing the barrier.
First, the inefficiencies and errors incurred by moving the schematic
across would disappear. This is especially obvious when the medium is
paper. Re-entering a paper schematic by hand at this point in the computer
age is outrageous. Transferring a schematic between different tools also
has the potential for introducing fatal errors into the design. 

Second, if the circuit engineering and the layout design were not
separated, then one can achieve better circuit performance in the final
product. High speed circuits, in particular, need care given to critical
paths and their layout. The timing budget can be kept significantly
tighter if one has good control over these critical paths. Improved
performance can also be obtained for analog circuits with sensitive (i.e.,
high gain) inputs. 

If these advantages exist, why does this wide gulf exist? In many ways, the
situation parallels the old way of producing letters in the office. It was
not long ago, the creation of letters was universally separated into those
who dictated letters and those who typed them. This was done because
typists got paid less than the executives who dictated, and executives did
not know how to type. 

What undercurrents changed this situation? The wide availability of word
processing on desktops forced the cost of a "do-it-yourself" letter below
the cost of dividing the labor. The quality of letter writing improved
because the author was there each step of the way. The executive who
didn't type became obsolete. 

The analogy to CAE and CAD is obvious. In the traditional scenario, layout
designers were paid less than EEs, and EEs were often not closely familiar
with the finer points of manufacturing. 

With more EDA software on the desktop, the money invested into a
"do-it-yourself' circuit will be less than that spent dividing the labor.
Circuits will be better because the designer will consider both behavior
and layout in the same light. Once these advantages are clear, electrical
engineers will learn whatever extra they need to know about manufacturing
to make the circuit successful. Rather than throwing the schematic "over
the fence," designers will create "do-it-yourself' PCB layouts. The
result? The industry will witness exceptional circuits created faster. 

The winds of change are beginning to blow today and will continue over the
next three to five years. The effect will be more integration between CAE
and CAD on the designer's desktop. The challenge has been that today's PCB
vendors find it too difficult to satisfy the requirements imposed by this
integration. 

Within the next three years, the PCB segment of the EDA industry will move
to the next stage of its evolution. Such change means that the PCB market
will not be stagnant. Vendors introducing PCB layout tools more in tune
with a more integrated design cycle will find that product development
efforts have not been wasted after all. 

MicroSim Corp
20 Fairbanks
Irvine, CA 92718
714-770-3022,  fax 714-455-0554,  BBS 714-830-1550
Sales@MicroSim.com
 
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