OnTrack: The PCB Design Podcast

IPC continues to develop resources to bring awareness about the electronics industry to the young generation.

In this episode, we are very fortunate to have Charlene Gunther, the Senior Director of the IPC Education Foundation. We will talk about IPC’s efforts to involve students in engaging activities that will introduce the electronic industry to them as early as high school.

Join us and watch through the end. We added some great resources below so be sure to check them out.

Watch this episode here

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Episode Highlights:

• Charlene Gunther introduction and a brief overview of her role as the Senior Director of the IPC Foundation
• Charlene talks about the IPC three pillars: awareness, engagement, and connections
• The IPC launched the website www.careersinelectronics.com which aims to attract students and job seekers within the electronics industry
• The IPC student chapter plays a big role to attract and involving students in skill development training and networking
• IPC is hosting annual STEM outreach and partners with Title I schools and private institutions to expose high school students to hands-on activities, connecting them with industry, allowing them to solder, to design, to learn about assembly
• Other departments of the IPC that work towards improving accessible education are the Education Department led by Vice President David Hernandez and Chris Mitchell the VP of Advocacy and Government Relations
• The universities’ response to IPC programs has been very positive and they have become more proactive in integrating electronics and manufacturing-related courses into their curriculum
• Be in the loop with the latest IPC Education Foundation announcements, visit www.careersinelectronics.com , subscribe to their newsletter, and follow their social media pages. Students, parents, and employers are encouraged to visit the website

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Charlene Gunter on LinkedIn
• Visit the IPC website
• Visit the Careers in Electronics website
• Learn more about IPC Education Foundation
• Watch related episodes:
  • The Challenging Role of a Process Engineer
  • IPC CEO John Mitchell on the Supporting American Printed Circuit Boards Act
  • Hands-on Learning for PCB Design Students with Sid Deliwala
• Learn Printed Circuit Board Design

 

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In this episode, we will learn so much about embedded CAN bus, for automobile security and performance straight from the water host, Ken Tindell the CTO of Canis Labs.

A lot of interesting facts about cyber security and automobile hacking that you would not want to miss! Watch through the end and make sure to check the additional resources below.

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Show Highlights:

• Ken Tindell’s background and how he got started with CAN bus and CAN security
• Ken worked with Motorola on designing the MS CAN—the first CAN controller that did all the buffer scheduling correctly
• Ethernet and CAN coexist in autonomous vehicles’ architecture, Ken explains how
• There are two types of major attacks on the CAN bus: attacking the physical wiring and attacking the computer that has access to the wiring. Zac and Ken talk about the mind-blowing advanced techniques of hacking automobiles
• Story of irony. A friend of Ken in automobile cybersecurity had his car stolen
• The biggest car-hacking horror would be through the cloud — cloud-based APIs to phone and at the same time CAN bus protocol hacking on the transceiver pins
• CAN HD, an augmentation for high speed and guarding the CAN bus
• Canis Labs is in the works to provide real solutions for security on CAN bus

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Ken Tindell on LinkedIn
• Visit Canis Automotive Labs' website
• Check out Ken’s Github Page
• Watch related podcast episodes:
  • Better Performance and Enhanced Reliability in the Automotive Electronics industry
  • Electronics Manufacturability and Reliability with QA Guru Cheryl Tulkoff

 

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In this episode, we continue the discussion on diversifying the electronic supply chain. Our guest Case Engelen the CEO of Titoma shares his insight about moving some of the manufacturing to other Southeast Asian countries and South America. 

Watch this episode now and check out the show notes and additional resources below.

Show Highlights:

• Case Engelen introduces himself and his company Titoma
• Offshoring, onshoring, and diversifying supply chain, why do the majority of components manufacturing may stay in China for 5 more years?
• Building prototypes and optimizing your design following the factory’s specifications
• Case talks about the importance of component architecture early during the design phase
• The difference between how US and Chinese market their product and their selling strategies
• Diversifying manufacturing in Southeast Asia and South America, Taiwan is a little more expensive than China, but Columbia is more competitive when it comes to cost
• The advanced manufacturing capabilities in China are quite hard to beat
• What is “bifurcation”?
• What does the future of electronics production and sourcing and procurement look like?

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Case Engelen on LinkedIn
• Visit Titoma Website
• Watch the Previous Related Episodes:
  • Mastering Your PCB Design Tool as the Industry Evolves with Stephen Chavez
  • Mitigating Risk Factors for PCB Manufacturing Lead Times
  • Data Security, 5G and Onshore PCB Manufacturing with Dr. Rob Spalding

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Happy Holden, a legend in the PCB Industry and one of our favorite Altium Industry Expert contributors gives us a trip to his 53 years of experience in the industry. From a chemical engineer, and PCB manufacturing expert to an educator with his countless contribution to the PCB industry’s wealth of knowledge through his books, column, and keynote presentations.

Watch this episode now

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to Happy Holden and an overview of his career in the PCB Industry
• What drove the PCB manufacturing off-shore? The printed circuit industry has been all over the map, to begin with
• Happy shares his early years in printed circuit manufacturing
• Comparing CAD tools from the 80s and the present – computers, calculators, and software
• Happy talks about photonic circuits back in 1998 and how it is a hundred thousand times more capable than electronic communication and have no signal integrity issue
• HP’s first notebook computer
• Happy retired from HP and moved to Taiwan
• Happy started working at Gentex Michigan
• The beginning of offshoring the PCB manufacturing and fabrication
• In Asia, the printing circuit board is like printing money. It is the most profitable industry in the region
• Globalization took over the industry – emphasis on profit versus jobs
• Diversifying the supply chain. How to bring some of the manufacturing sides of the industry back to the US?
  • The $52 Billion budget (CHIPS Act 2022) is just a downpayment to bring the 30 years that were lost
• Would companies start manufacturing their own products?
• How did HDI technology come about?

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Happy Holden on LinkedIn
• Read Happy Holden’s Articles on Altium’s Resource Page
• Read Happy Holden’s Biography on HPMuseum.org
• Buy Happy Holden’s Printed Circuits Handbook, Seventh Edition
• Download FREE Ebook I-Connect007 Publishes Automation eBook by Happy Holden
• Watch the Previous Episode with Happy Holden: The Father of HDI PCBs

Functional testing is when you power up an electronic device for the first time and then perform voltage rail checks and programming of processors, and more. And this is exactly what FixturFab offers their customer.

In this episode, Zach is talking with the co-founders of FixturFab, Duncan Lowder and Joe Selvik. They will have a chat about automated test fixtures and turnkey systems that aid low to medium electronic production to deliver successful devices.

Watch this episode here.

Show Highlights:

• Jow Selvic and Duncan Lowder introduction and engineering backgrounds
• What is FixturFab’s test fixture? Duncan briefly explains how it works – the mechanical, electrical, and software aspects of it
• A turnkey test system designs and delivers specific test cases and dives into detail about how a circuit board was designed and gathers reports
• Bolina an IIOT device deployment engine allows the management of Test Fixtures remotely
• An ideal customer for FixturFab is anyone who designs or manufactures their hardware, the best time to initiate the testing is before finalizing the board layout or during the prototyping phase
• Currently, FixturFab caters to low to medium-volume production, but they definitely are looking forward to eventually being in an automated SMT (Surface Mount Technology) line
• Coming next is the Test System in a Box, the IKEA or the “protolab” for test fixtures

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Joe Selvik on LinkedIn
• Connect with Duncan Lowder on LinkedIn
• Visit FixturFab website
• Read: Generating an Altium Test Point Report
• Watch related episodes:
  • Electronics Manufacturability and Reliability with QA Guru Cheryl Tulkoff
  • Mitigating Risk Factors for PCB Manufacturing Lead Times

In this episode, we are fortunate to have two key personalities at Luxonis, a hardware, firmware, software, AI, and simulation company. Erik Kokalj, director of application engineering at Luxonis, and Bradley Dillon, CEO of Luxonis discuss how and who can benefit from AI technology.

Tune in and make sure to check out the show notes and additional resources below.

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to Luxonis and its founding on April 2019
• The liDAR and radar as an imaging technology, Erik briefly explains the technology behind it
• Bradley shares why they decided to open-source some aspects of their platform and design
• Luxonis’s AI training, AI conversion, and AI deployment onto hardware are all open-source, for their customers can quickly develop their own model and then deploy it on the device itself
• Future design updates, miniaturization, and thermal management
• What are some of the industrial applications that are utilizing the Luxonis imaging technology? Beekeeping was unexpected!
• Robotic applications on robotic cars, Zach and Erik talk about action recognition on top of object recognition
• Bradley talks about series 3 products and what’s coming in terms of capabilities – processing power, more AI inference

Resources and Links:

• Connect with Bradley Dillon on LinkedIn
• Connect with Erik Kokalj on LinkedIn
• Checkout Luxonis Website
• Watch Luxonis featured on Altium Story: How Luxonis uses Altium 365 to innovate AI Vision systems faster
• Connect with Zach Peterson on LinkedIn

In this episode, we are very excited to have Jesus Zozaya, CEO of Voltera, and Matt Ewertowski, product manager at Voltera. We will discuss pushing the boundaries in electronics design through printed electronics.

Join us and together let’s discover the many benefits of printed electronics from expedited prototyping, proof of concept, and academic research.

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to Jesus Zozaya, CEO of Voltera, and Matt Ewertowski, product manager at Voltera
• Jesus takes the lead in explaining what Voltera does, and introduced their first product – V-one
• Matt explains the difference between Printed Electronics and additive manufacturing process
• Electronics printer pushes the limits and welcomes new possibilities and opportunities for new materials in the electronic design space
• Voltera designed NOVA (their second product) with users in mind, they created a tool that all electrical engineers can utilize regardless of their skills in material science
• Can you do stack-ups using printed electronics?
• Jesus talks about a customer who created heaters directly on the drone’s wings to melt the ice when flying in cold temperature
• A Voltera customer printed electronics directly on a textile (face mask) that will allow a smartphone app to track the level of CO2 on the face mask
• Mark dives deep into the capabilities of NOVA
• Who is the target market for V-one and how does it differentiate from NOVA
  • The V-one is seen to be utilize more for prototyping, meanwhile NOVA is popular with academic and R and D research
• Printed electronics do not replace traditional marketing, but it aids to expedite the process of getting the proof of concept done

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Jesus Zezoya on LinkedIn
• Connect with Matt Ewertowski on LinkedIn
• Visit Voletra’s website
• Related Podcast Episodes:
  • 3D Printed Circuit Boards for Fast Prototyping
  • The Promising and Challenging Future of 3D Printed Electronics
  • Materials Science and Manufacturing of Better PCB
• Connect with Zach Peterson on LinkedIn

 

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Having Steve Sandler in this episode is such a treat! He talks about his presentations at the upcoming DesignCon 2023 in Santa Clara. He gives us a deep dive into some very complex engineering topics, including measuring the PDN Flatness and the state space model.

Download this episode

Show Highlights:

• Steve Sandler is in the running for Engineering of the Year along with Ken Wyatt
• Steve is doing a two-and-a-half-hour tutorial on PSMR, PSOR, and PSMR testing at the DesignCon. Molex and Tektronix are both participating in the live demonstration
  • He s also doing a presentation with Heidi Barnes, Bandanin, and Ben Denon
• A lot of conferences are going virtual. The reach is undeniably great, however, what are the pros and the cons? What is valuable to who?
• Steve talks about the conception of Picotest in the US
• Picotest made the very first water-cooled probe which he will be showing at the DesignCon
• Innovative solutions can take decades from conception to fruition, Steve shares his PdD thesis from 2011 that got him ahead of the curve
• Steve deeps dive into the water-cooled probe, how it works, and the problems it eliminates
• 21:34 Power supply stability is critical in space, 
• 23:28 What does it mean to quantify the flatness of the PDN? Steve co-authored a paper with Scott Witcher which will be presented at the DesignCon
• 26:25 Steve Sandler wrote a paper in 2015: Target Impedance Limitations and Rogue Wave Assessments on PDN Performance
• 31:29 FACTS! Computers in Space Station are being reset every 40 minutes
• 33:13 Steve stresses the importance of simulation and gives engineers a tip: “Start out with proven models and you'll get there. Get enough confidence.“
• 34:39 Steve explains why it is necessary to find the “Q” to measure PDN Flatness
• 43:19 Innovation could have happened earlier, Steve talks about the typical economic problems that could be hindering technological advancements
• 47:51 Steve gives us a brief deep dive into the “state space model” and what it’s attempting to quantify

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Steve Sandler on LinkedIn
• Visit Picotest website
• Check out Steve Sandler's Books
• Register to DesignCon 2023

One of PCEA’s (Printed Circuit Engineering Association) goals is to provide accessible education, affordable to everyone in the electronics industry.

In this episode, we are fortunate to have two passionate educators in the industry, Mike Buetow and Mike Creeden. We will talk about the PCEA’s efforts to use all possible platforms to promote educational programs for design engineers.

PCEA, it's an international network of engineers, designers, fabricators, assemblers…anyone who is involved in printed circuit development. And we promote Printed Circuit Engineering as a profession. We're looking at trying to take information, new design concepts, get them down into the manufacturing side, and then also to communicate those manufacturing constraints and make sure that they are communicated back to the design side. -Mike Buetow

Watch the episode here

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to PCEA and updates on its acquisition of key assets of UP Media Group
• Mike Buetow talks about the PCB East conference reboot
• Who can benefit from PCEA’s educational initiatives?
• Mike Creeden emphasizes the importance of in-person learning. “Online is good, but it lacks some retention…but in-person learning, you retain more,” he explains.
• To collaborate, educate and inspire is what’s behind PCEA educational efforts
• PCEA is a volunteer-driven organization
• Mike Creeden will be at the https://www.ipcapexexpo.org/in San Diego
• Mike Creeden debunks misconceptions about PCB manufacturing facilities, the skills involved, the compensation, and more
• There are some issues in design education around packaging, the Insulectro booth at IPC Apex 2023 will offer valuable knowledge about packaging
• PCEA membership is free, you can register here
  • Mentorship programs are something to look forward to
  • Currently, PCEA has chapters in Europe, Mexico, Canada, Australia, and across the United States

Links and Resources:

• Visit PCEA’s website
• Connect with Mike Creeden on LinkedIn
• Connect with Mike Buetow on LinkedIn
• Watch Previous Related Episodes:
  • New Printed Circuit Engineering Course: PCE EDU
  • Mike Buetow on PCB West

 

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Expedite your transition from prototype to scale with the help of an experienced PCB broker! In this episode, a returning guest joins us to discuss everything that involves cost-effective PCB manufacturing. Greg Papandrew, a PCB buying and selling expert, gives us a comprehensive understanding of PCB cost drivers and tips on a good supply chain strategy.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• The process of buying and selling, Greg Papandrew is a PCB broker with 30 years of experience in the industry
• Greg emphasizes the importance of quoting smartly, learning when, where, and how to save money without sacrificing the PCB quality
• What is a good supply chain strategy?
• Greg dives deep into his role as a PCB broker, and his involvement in the decision making involving specs, materials, cost, and more
• Sending too much information can be problematic, and it involves the vulnerability of intellectual property
• Good communication with the PCB manufacturer and fabricator can go a long way; asking the right questions can help with the production of high-quality products with a fair pricing
• What is the anatomy of a complete data package?
  • What's in a File list and a README file 
• Greg answers, at what stage of the process does a PCB designer or manufacturer approach a PCB broker?

Links and Resources:

Connect with Greg Papandrew on LinkedIn
Watch a previous episode with Greg Panandrew: How to Buy PC Boards From a Board Shop
Watch Greg’s video: How to Avoid Self-inflicted PCB Costs
Visit DirectPCB - Better Board Buying website
Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Visit Nexar website
Visit Octopart website

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If you look at the way people have used FPGAs, they are a miracle product in many ways. -Mark Oliver

Our guest Mark Oliver, VP of marketing at Efinix talks about the evolving role of FPGAs in the industry beyond prototyping. Mark will give us a very insightful use of FPGA as an efficient custom silicon solution and will go deep on the importance of RISC-V for processor designs.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to Efinix, an FPGA company
  • Mark starts off by addressing the inefficient ways designers use FPGAs and how this has helped them develop a product that can be utilized from prototyping and straight to high-volume manufacturing
  • Efinix FPGAs are cost-effective, low-power, and small-form efficient for custom silicon solution
• The common FPGAs integration including the SIP (Session Initial Protocol) implementation
• FPGA market is set to explode because it is going in the same direction as the current industry growth
  • they  are designed as mid-volume production solutions with the potential for scalability
• Given that the industry is dominated by software engineers Efinix moves its course to RISC-V processor integration
  • What is RISC-V and why it is so important for processor design, specifically for FPGAs?
• FPGAs already offer great benefits and there will be more to come

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Mark Oliver on LinkedIn
• Visit Efinix website
• Read Related Articles:
  • How to Start an FPGA PCB Layout For Your Embedded System
  • Designing for the FPGA Pin Mapper
  • SoC FPGA Boasts RISC-V Processor
• Watch Related Altium Academy Videos:
  • FPGA Pins Explained!
  • FPGA and BGA PCB Power Delivery Best Practices
• Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
• Full OnTrack Podcast Library
• Altium Website

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Join us as we reflect on the best moments and the coolest guests we've had on the OnTrack podcast this year. 2012 has been a whirlwind year for the electronics industry–chip shortages, and a supply chain crunch. Altium has passed several milestones, as well as releasing an education program. And there have been some groundbreaking reports from industry groups highlighting the need for workforce training and development, and workforce shortages coming on the horizon.

Watch the episode here

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Show Highlights:

• One of Altium’s Milestone is the Altium Education Program
• In most of the episodes, the issue of automotive chips shortage comes up coupled with the passing of the PCB Act
• PCB Packaging, and production of integrated circuit substrates 
• Most requested repeat guests and new faces

Links and Resources:

• Watch all the OnTrack Podcast Episode
• Register at Altium Education for Free
• Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
• Visit Nexar website
• Visit Octopart website

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Young blood in the PCB industry, Christopher Bonsell talks about process engineering–the chemical involved in the PCB, etching and encouraging the young generation to the “cool-tech” aspects of PCB design and manufacturing.

Watch this episode through the end, and check the show notes and additional below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Chris Bonsell published articles on i-Connect007
• What kind of services does Chemcut offer related to PCB manufacturing and the role of a process engineer
• Chris talks about his career journey and how he landed his position in Chemcut
• Misconception about the circuit board industry, does it belong to tech industry?
• The grand challenge – the Moorse Law
• What is the Peri Etch Process?
• The lack of interest in the chemistry of circuit boards might be what’s blocking the PCB industry from moving to the next level of processing capability
• The US is 20 years behind in the PCB industry
• Is fully additive circuit board could be the big game changer in the industry?
• Workforce shortage industry – how to involve students and the younger generation to become interested in the PCB industry?
• Chris explains etching uniformity

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Christoper Bonsell on LinkedIn
• Visit Chemcut website
• Read Chris’s articles on i-Connect007
• Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
• Visit Nexar website
• Visit Octopart website

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Let’s take a glimpse into a life of a young process engineer. In this episode, our guest Paige Fiet talks about her career path in the world of PCB manufacturing. She will also share how she landed her role as the Student Liaison in the IPC.

Watch this episode through the end or listen on the go. We hope to inspire young engineers to become more motivated to jump into the PCB industry.

Show Highlights:

• Paige shares her story and her exciting career path before she landed her role as a process engineer at TTM Technologies
• Zach and Paige exchange college experiences, they talk about the courses and curriculum then and now
• Paige briefly talks about her experience in getting the role of the IPC Student Liaison
  • She also talks about how interested engineers can become involved in the IPC and encourage them to invest in a membership and attend other industry-related trade shows and conferences
  • Participating in committees can be a rewarding and fun experience
• Paige had her eyes on TTM from the very beginning. She summed up her role as a process engineer as working on improving processes' efficiency and quality on a daily basis
• Preventing mistakes before they happen is one of the challenging but exciting parts of the job
• There are so many opportunities in the industry and the next generation’s industry expert has a huge room to fill
• Manufacturing misconceptions, Zach and Paige emphasize the exciting opportunities in the PCB manufacturing Industry and encourage young engineers to explore this space

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Paige on LinkedIn
• Visit TTM Technologies website
• Watch Paige Interview: IPC Student Board Member Liaison
• Watch a related episode: IPC CEO John Mitchell on the Supporting American Printed Circuit Boards Act

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Visit Nexar website

Visit Octopart website

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It’s that time again to have Altium’s VP of Marketing, Lawrence Romine, the bearer of good news when it comes to Altium Designer’s latest features. We will discuss what’s coming in Altium Designer 23 which includes multi-board and harness design capabilities.

You don’t want to miss this one. Watch through the end and be sure to check the show notes and additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights

• Altium Designer®’s regular and reliable updates are incomparable in the industry, stay on top of the monthly updates through the OnTrack newsletter
• There are 3 major themes to come in Altium Designer 2023
  • Multi-board systems and harness design – empower PCB designers and electrical engineers to design harnesses
  • Collaboration and teamwork
  • Make Altium Designer a necessity for every PCB designer – the world's greatest and most elegant design experience
• Code Designer, coming soon – the ability to work natively in Altium Designer and in Mcad tool of choice
• Multi-board and harness design capability, Altium Designer is fully supported through Altium 365
• It's never too soon to involve the other stakeholders in your PCB design
  • Altium 365 releases commenting capability to both bombs and draftsman documents
• New power analysis capability powered by Keysight, anybody that can design a printed circuit board can now do some power analysis
• Altium Designer users are encouraged to check out all of the extensions, especially the new power analyzer

Links and Resources:

Connect with Lawrence Romine on LinkedIn

• Stay on top of Altium Designer versions updates
• What’s new in Altium 365
• Read: Come See the New Power Analyzer by Keysight in Altium Designer 22.9
• Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
• Visit Nexar website
• Visit Octopart website

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Materials Science and how this can level up your PCB manufacturability.

In this episode, our guest Geoffrey Leeds the product manager at Insulectro talks about how material science can help solve the unique manufacturing challenges fabricators are dealing with HDI designs.

Listen through the end and check the additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

 

• Geoffrey Leed’s role as a product manager at Insulectro, a material science distributor
• What is material science and how does it relates to PCB manufacturing
• Ultra HDI designs present unique manufacturing challenges to PCB fabricators
• How are your material choices impacting your design performance?
• Geoffrey explains why having lower CTE materials could be a double-edged sword
• Perfect is the enemy of good enough! You must accept some level of tolerance when your product moves into production and goes out into the real world, It can be the material tolerance or the electrical performance
• The PCB industry has been walking in the packaging industry's footsteps for quite some time and the CHIPS act has become one of the drivers of this movement
• Would a set of alphanumerical rules help designers with HDI designs? Geoffrey answered with the phrase “curse of the easy button”
• Geoffrey recognizes IPC’s effort as the governing body in the standardization of PCB design and manufacturability- heterogeneous

Links and Resources:

 

Connect with Geoffrey Leeds on LinkedIn

Follow Insulectro on LinkedIn

Visit Insulectro’s website here

Watch Related Episode: Mike Creeden on Empowering PCB Engineers through PCE-A

 

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Visit Nexar website

Visit Octopart website

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This is a very interesting episode, especially for hardware engineers. Duncan Haldane, the CEO, and co-founder of JITX joins us to share a very interesting approach to PCB design. JITX is a way for hardware engineers to write code to design circuit boards.

I know you are excited to hear more! Watch this episode or listen on the go. Be sure to check out the show notes and additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Duncan talks about the Series A funding from Sequoia Capital and the general availability of JITX as an actual product.
• Duncan's path to engineering started in robotics
• How can an electrical engineer benefit from JITX? Duncan explained in detail
• JITX is very well integrated with Altium, it works natively with the existing designs and libraries 
• Hardware-generated code transforms the job of an engineer a little bit so that they don't have to manually look through all of the different specs for every component that they need
• JITX is a Nexar partner and uses Octoparts data, in addition, they built a different type of database that's meant for part optimization.
• Reusable expert hardware engineering knowledge is one of JITX’s ultimate goals
  • They are building full automation for boards, new kinds of routing algorithms, new kinds of placement algorithms, and checks for physical geometry
• The future is optimization
  • Zach and Duncan excitedly talked about AI, and how it can be used to drive some parameters to create new designs
• Electrical engineers’ job is secure, automation can help with the shortage, but will not replace electrical engineers’ jobs
• What the future looks like for JITX

Links and Resources:

Connect with Duncan Haldane on LinkedIn
Visit JITX website
Read JITX Launches General Availability And Announces $12M Series A From Sequoia Capital

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Visit Nexar website
Visit Octopart website

 

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Electronic parts shortages coupled with inflation has been affecting the electronic industry globally. Chris Cain our guest for today’s episode is a supply chain consultant and former VP at Keysight working on supply chain and supply chain products.

Chris will share with us his 37 years of experience and strategies to overcome electronic part shortages.

Watch this episode here

Show Higlights:

• Chris Cain briefly describes what supply management is, and his role as a consultant.
• Chris explains what it means to tap into the “scale for the larger ecosystem” of electronic providers
  • Find alternatives and make some design adjustments where is possible
  • Look for parts that are very scalable like memory parts and FPGAs
  • Modular approach or designing for modules may also allow designers to have some flexibility
• If you can't get the parts, you can't ship your working design–having an insight into what’s coming in the supply chain could help designers in their decision making
  • It pays to spend a little time keeping up with groups like IPC which does the groundwork of looking up the industry and what they think is coming
• Chris warns designers about silk-screened sand, he added “never pay, until you verify”
• Moving towards an open source model, Zach mentioned a recent article on All About Circuits which talks about companies transitioning their chip architectures to RISC-V to help them overcome some of these supply chain issues
• What is supply chain resilience?
  • Fuel costs push up the cost of everything else it's related to and it's essentially an inflation driver
  • Avoid buying three year supply of parts, it’s smarter to focus on design flexibility and overall sourcing flexibility
• What are the challenges involved with raw materials supplies for assembly?
• The dark scenarios, the dark side, the disaster scenarios

Links and Resources:

Connect with Christopher Cain on LinkedIn
Watch a related Podcast episode: The Benefits of Diversifying PCB Industry Supply Chain
Read Chris Cain’s Latest Article: Maximum Usage to Improve Supply Chain Resiliency

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn
Full OnTrack Podcast Library
Altium Website

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Ben Nibali, founder and President of Aptus Design Works, with Connor Richardson, the Electrical Designer, are our guests in this episode. We will discuss how you can plan the cost and lead times to successfully launch your product in the market.

Ben and Connor share some excellent advice for designers and companies to streamline their product development process from prototyping to manufacturing.

 

Show Highlights:

• Aptus is a design and engineering company, and they’ve been around for about 15 years
  • They handle initial concept development, mechanical development, controls, and mechanical prototyping and help their clients through the launching and manufacturing of their products
• Expecting and avoiding pitfalls comes with experience; in addition, working with trusted vendors and suppliers is huge when honoring set schedules or timeline
• The natural state of every project is over budget and behind schedule. Ben Nibali stresses the importance of effort and discipline to have complete control of the process  and deliver on time
• Some unrealistic expectations by Aptus’s clients typically involve defying the law of physics
  • Other challenges include expectations from not knowing the process and cost expectations based on the higher volume of current products that really can’t be met in a US market-based launch scenario
  • Clients need to realize that there is a proper “cost of engineering”
• There are also misconceptions about 3D printing–in reality, it takes days to print 3D objects
  • You can’t have fast, cheap, and high quality at the same time
• Software guys may often misunderstand that modifications on hardware  are not as simple to execute as they will be on software
  • The “minimum viable product” is a great idea and works exceptionally well in software because you can add, modify, change, and grow something slowly after you deploy. In hardware, it is an entirely different cost structure to make changes once you start making anything physical. 
• “Proof of concept” is often neglected when companies want to launch their products immediately
• Connor Richardson shares the most complex and fun project they did at Aptus
  • Another exciting prototype they created is the cow-milking robot
• Ben gives designers and companies a piece of advice on how to plan cost and lead times when launching their products
  • The most important factor is market research, understanding what this thing that we're going to sell is? How are we going to sell it? Who's going to buy it? What features matter? 
  • The better the client understands the world they're going to try to sell into and how they're going to sell it, the more valuable our work will be and the higher likelihood that they'll make a profit
• Creating high-quality products could mean years of planning

Links and Resources:

Connect with Ben Nibali on LinkedIn
Connect with Connor Richardson on LinkedIn
Visit Aptus Design Works website
Watch How APTUS Designworks uses Altium 365 and Altimade to reduce cost and move more quickly
Altium Story presents Breaking down the barriers to progress - APTUS Designworks

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Matt Kelly is the  Chief Technologist at IPC. In this episode we will discuss all about the technological challenges the industry is facing. Matt will help us understand the “ecosystem” involving the semiconductor industry, advanced packaging, and IC substrates.

Watch this episode here

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Check the show notes and additional resources below.

Show Highlights:

• Matt Kelly’s role as the Chief Technologist at IPC
• The Moore's Law is continuing, but it is economically becoming difficult to maintain, this has become the driving force behind heterogeneous integration 
• What does the CHIPS Act really mean for manufacturers?
• Production of semiconductors is an expensive business–one fabrication infrastructure can cost an average of 20 billion dollars
• Matt stresses the need in the industry to use, and understand the “ecosystem” involving the semiconductor industry, advanced packaging, and IC substrates
• The US has a 20-year market leader, knowhow gap, weak sub-tier supply, skilled workforce shortage, and lack of raw materials
• The industry needs to spend time looking at the big picture, take the bigger messages, and convert them into actual change
• A significant shift in the workforce–PCB designers are a scarce commodity. In the near future, printed circuit board designers may have to double as IC substrate designers
• The global supply chain is alive and well, a change to a regional and global mindset is necessary to overcome most of the industry challenges
  • Matt shares the same scenario with produce shoppers in the summertime, you try to buy your fresh fruits and vegetables locally from your local farmers or whatever, but yet you still go to the grocery store
• IPC’s focus is on increasing workforce skills development in the areas of design and assembly
  • IPC is sponsoring the Advanced Packaging Symposium, Building the Substrate and Packaging Assembly Ecosystem in Washington, DC, on October 11th and 12th

Links and Resources:

Follow Matt Kelly on LinkedIn
Learn more about the IPC’s Advanced Packaging Symposium, Building the Substrate and Packaging Assembly Ecosystem
Watch related podcast episode:
    The Benefits of Diversifying PCB Industry Supply Chain
    IPC CEO John Mitchell on the Supporting American Printed Circuit Boards Act
    What is in the PCB Bill?
Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Full OnTrack Podcast Library
Altium Website

 

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