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44 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I APRIL 2020 ways reach out to me (stephen.chavez.pcea@ gmail.com) or Kelly Dack (kelly.dack.pcea@ gmail.com) to get more information, as well. Our evolution as a professional association within the industry is progressing as planned. We continue to solidify the foundation of PCEA now that the executive board leadership has been voted on and is in place. Our web- site is a work in progress with a new and im- proved version ready this spring. Our incorpo- ration status of 501(c)(6) non-profit is coming together as planned. We should be getting our employer identification number (EIN) within a few weeks. Things are moving very fast and coming to- gether very nicely due to the outstanding ef- forts, positive attitude, and passion that each of the PCEA executive board members brings to the table. This is truly the right group of in- dustry leaders to take on such a task and make it successful! I feel very humbled and blessed to be a part of such a team. PCEA Chapter Spotlight by Bob McCreight PRESIDENT OF THE SILICON VALLEY CHAPTER On February 13, the Silicon Valley Chapter enjoyed a spon- sored "lunch and learn" event and some very interesting pre- sentations. After lunch, the technical director for design education at Insulectro, Mike Creeden, began the presentation portion by filling us in on the formation of the PCEA. As the electronics industry is becoming aware, the PCEA is a new association that has been formed to inspire and support collabora- tion and education between all facets of the PCB engineering, manufacturing, and test sec- tors. There was a great amount of interest from the audience with regard to the new organi- zation, and several followed up with various queries. Following a round of introductions from everyone in attendance, Faisal Ahmed, an application engineer at Cadence, provided a short demonstration of some new enhance- m e n t s t o A l l e g ro , such as DesignTrue DFM Technology. This fresh take on design settings lever- ages technology files that are programmed to match the manu- facturing capabil- ity from participat- ing manufacturing partners. Designers now appear to have a di- rect link to DFM settings for some suppliers. Faisal also explained Cadence's 3D Canvas— a high-quality 3D visualization engine—and the Symphony Team Design Option, which allows multiple designers or teams to per- form concurrent engineering using a shared canvass without having to set up a partitioned project. Fo l l o w i n g t h e Cadence presenta- tion, the meeting pro- gressed to the feature presentation by Atar Mittal, general man- ager of Sierra Cir- cuits' Design and As- sembly Division. Atar presented his paper "Signal Degradation on PCB Transmission Lines: Causes and Remedies" and shared some vital points—including signal reflections, cross- talk, EMI, and PCB materials—comprising a very insightful talk that held audience atten- tion and resulted in a detailed Q&A session at the end. All in all, the meeting went quite well, with 30 PCB engineering professionals in atten- dance. Our thanks go to Mike Creeden, Ca- dence, and Sierra Circuits for providing their resources and expertise, which contributed to the success of this event. Our next PCEA meeting will be on April 23, hosted by Amazon and sponsored by Altium. Chris Carlson, an FAE with Altium, will be the main speaker. I hope to see you then in Sunny- vale, California. Detailed announcements will go out later this month. Faisal Ahman Atar Mittal