Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1219242
10 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I MARCH 2020 Merriam-Webster's online dictionary defines the word "profit" this way: 1. A valuable return: Gain. 2. The excess of returns over expenditure in a transaction or series of transactions, especially: The excess of the selling price of goods over their cost. It's easy to define profit, but it's much more difficult to define exactly what "de- sign for profitability" (DFP) means to today's PCB designers and design engineers. How can technologists create profit in every de- sign when the board's stakeholders are of- ten spread out across several time zones and continents? It's a tough concept to get your arms around. Some of you work in giant OEMs; do you have any idea how much your last design cost—man-hours, components, laminates, etc.? When I started working on this issue, I was happy to hear that many designers were al- ready familiar with DFP. When I first men- tioned DFP to designers years ago, they'd look at me like I had two heads. After all, de- signers used to feel as if they were the lowest person on the totem pole, and many didn't realize the power that they wield over the profit of the PCB and, potentially, the final product. Fortunately, that has changed, for the most part. In a recent Design007 Magazine survey, about two-thirds of respondents said that cost is a definite factor in their design process. Ap- Design for Profitability Now Part of the Process The Shaughnessy Report by Andy Shaughnessy, I-CONNECT007