Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1114420
MAY 2019 I DESIGN007 MAGAZINE 37 is premature, and I can answer it in about six months. Toward the end of this year, we're go- ing to have some things realized that provide the opportunity for the collaboration. Then, we can say, "We've built the foundation. It's CAD- nostic and manufacturing agnostic. Is anybody going to join?" Johnson: It will be interesting to see how the continued implementation of protocols like CFX and Hermes for Industry 4.0 smart fac- tories may help turn the balance to a greater acceptance of data transferring collaboratively. Arcuri: Definitely. That's another piece. I don't mean it to sound like I hate our industry, but it just hasn't evolved. It's stuck in a very siloed, monolithic paradigm and the world around us isn't. Taxi drivers resisted, and then Uber changed that landscape, like it or not. It's go- ing to take constant pressure to change our in- dustry because you can't change the personal- ity of a person, a company, or an entire indus- try just through a speech. And in many cas- es, that pressure comes from the consumers of these products, components, manufacturing services, and equipment. Kicking and scream- ing, we are pushing the industry into submis- sion, but I don't think it's going very willingly into the night yet. Industry professionals understand that they have to slowly get onboard, which is a step in the right direction. The rate of change will con- tinue to accelerate, and everybody says Indus- try 4.0 is needed, it's happening, and they're on board with it. But the day that I can make it possible to feed a file to something and drive a JUKI, Panasonic, Yamaha, Siemens, and a MY- DATA machine without someone having to sit there figuring out which rotation the diode has to be, I'll be a happy camper. Another thing that drives people crazy is that Industry 4.0 is a nice phrase, but we're more like Industry 1.2. Three years ago, I was stand- ing on my factory floor looking at $10 million worth of capital equipment, test machines, QA inspectors, and all kinds of great techni- cians, and once a month, we still put a diode on backward? How does that happen? Holden: To bring us back to the original top- ic of design rules, what we're talking about is boundary conditions for many separate goals. In the electronics business, every PCB and product has something to try to differentiate it from the competitor's product. These goals to differentiate our products and support innova- tion drives us to a different set of design rules for every board and product. Unfortunately, since electronics have no boundary in terms of where it's going, these goals and directions are constantly going to be manipulated, and as you said, all we can do is potentially have collaborative software or something similar. If the goal was boundary conditions of cost, supportability, distribution, or environmental, it would say, "Start with these design rules and see how far you can get with it before you have to start changing them because the design rules compete with each other." Something has to win out. Like density, if you want to make lines smaller, that means materials have to be thinner. If you don't have the materials or if you can't stand the signal loss, then you have to use wide traces. That competes with my density and size goal. The biggest thing is that we don't have a tool that shows us or allows us to play with these trade- offs and "what ifs." Because of tight schedules, we just have to grab a number, guess, and go with it. Right or wrong, time doesn't allow us the luxury of doing it. Otherwise, you can do it over. You only have enough time to do it once and cross your fingers that we got close to the reliability, cost, or supportability goals that were set. Arcuri: I envision a world where you can see re- al-time effects as you're doing something and your changes are captured so that you can un- derstand the various impacts. Shaughnessy: We appreciate your time, Craig. Arcuri: It's my pleasure. Thank you. DESIGN007