Hardware Design Engineers Wear Many Hats

As the workforce evolves and design complexity requirements increase, we are seeing roles expand. Engineers who were once regarded as specialists will now be required to understand a variety of tasks. Yesterday’s specialists in individual point tools will become tomorrow’s design specialists, capable of problem-solving across the systems development spectrum.

Challenges facing engineers

In my recent article, “The Changing Face of the Hardware Design Engineer,”  I discussed some of the challenges facing the independent hardware engineer.

There are also an increasing number of trade-offs to consider:

• Complexity is being driven in a number of ways: smaller device footprints with increased functionality, higher electronics content in vehicles, higher speeds, advances in packaging, and so-forth.
• Looking at customer designs, over the last five years, layer counts have dropped 12 percent, board area has dropped 35 percent, and densities have gone up by 15 percent.
• Competitive business environments increase the need for better time-to-market, lower cost, and higher quality; the pressure is on.

Managing the trade-offs between all of these variables can be near-impossible and the tools at the engineers disposal must evolve to simplify design complexity, increase individual productivity, and enable engineering organizations to do more – all  the while remaining affordable.

Engineers may operate independently, or within smaller project teams. Either way, the need for readily available, ease-to-use, and affordable design tools that address design creation, analysis and verification, FPGA integration and PCB layout, and more is very much a reality.

A gap in tool offerings

Traditionally, enterprise-level tools may be inaccessible due to cost, or because the engineer was working outside of the enterprise “grid.” Furthermore, lower-cost desktop tools often simply do not have the horsepower or functionality required to get the job done.

Filling the gap

The new PADS portfolio, introduces innovative technology at unbeatable prices to fill the need of today’s engineers who wear many hats. With scalable functionality, PADS products grow with you as your technology demands increase.

Are you one of the independent engineers who find themselves doing it all? Are you becoming less of a tool specialist and more of a design specialist? Let me know, I’d like to hear from you.

Also, why not take a look at the new PADS product portfolio? Compare pricing, check out some of the product videos, and see for yourself how PADS can address your complex technological challenges.