Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1114420
36 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I MAY 2019 ited with that, by the way, unless it's already been collared by somebody else, but I'm go- ing to call it CAD-nostic. A CAD-nostic view of manufacturing says, "Every manufacturer has certain constraints, requirements, and in- put data needs. If I can create something in front that gives them those things in a much more predictable way, then I will save them time and get the customer more predictable re- sults across many manufacturers, whether that manufacturer is in New York, California, Tex- as, or Germany." Altium 365 is a product we've talked about, and what's in the marketplace today is about 2% of what we envision that to be. If I look at our aspirational goals for the future, we believe that the underpinnings like Octopart and Cii- va, for instance, will be foundational pieces as well as cloud-based infrastructure. Something above that, like Altium 365, needs to truly use advanced software techniques and latest meth- odologies to bind all of that together. We are fe- verishly working on that across the globe. Shaughnessy: We've had some people ask, "Why isn't there a universal input data for design rules?" We have universal output like ODB++, IPC-2581, or Gerber, but there's no universal input. It sounds like 365 is along those lines. Is that how you're looking at it? Arcuri: Yes, one of the reasons that a universal input doesn't exist today is because it really is hard. You don't have one component supplier to go to. There are hundreds of component suppliers who represent data sheets completely differently and have different equipment. How you program a JUKI machine to place parts on the board is different than how you program a Yamaha machine, etc. With- in a factory, there are all kinds of dif- ferent equipment, which creates vari- ous variables. Then, you have different technologies and customer demands, and they're using different CAD sys- tems. Some of them are experts with those CAD systems, and some of those have the iPhone approach, which is, "I opened an app and I'm now a board designer. It worked in the app. Why can't they build it?" You have to create something that people want to be part of and want to put their collective knowledge into as opposed to saying, "I've created this. Now, all of you must adopt it." That is our challenge and mission, but not only for Altium 365. In a perfect world, we would be overjoyed if a Mentor, Cadence, or Zuken user got the same benefit that an Altium user would get. Johnson: How much traction do you find right now from other vendors in the marketplace to participate? Arcuri: On the manufacturing side, I can't answer that question yet. Ask me in three months. On the component side, as you might expect, some are very cooperative. In other words, "This electronic data feeds of all our parametric data." Others say, "Here's a data sheet. If you want the data, scrape it off the data sheet." How would I answer that? I'm not sure I touch enough people to answer it broad- ly other than to say there are so many people involved. Some factories have the attitude of, "I don't want to tell you anything because if I do, that will make me the same as the next company." Other factories are very open. I don't talk to CAD tool suppliers very of- ten other than I have a fair amount of experi- ence with Cadence. Again, I think the question