Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1514189
12 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I JANUARY 2024 me in Neenah, Wisconsin; Guadalajara, Mex- ico; Raleigh, North Carolina; and Boulder, Colorado. Now that San Diego PCB Design has been purchased by APCT, I'm enjoying learning more about advanced fabrication as a design manager on the fab shop side. Shaughnessy: What do you think designers and design engineers need to know about manufacturing processes? Bell: ey need to know that the manufacturing pro- cess is ever-changing. is goes for electrical inter- faces, fabrication, assem- bly, and test. Designing in a vacuum without a desire to learn new things can be stifling to a designer's abil- ity to grow in their capabili- ties as well as their ability to contribute to their organi- zation. Barry Matties: We've been talking for years about this disconnect between designers and fabricators, and how many designers have never been in a fabrication facility. If I'm looking to contract a designer, the smartest strategy might be for me to find a designer who actually works in a fab facil- ity, because that's where the best DFM would come from. Bell: Sure. You know, there's not a one-size- fits-all answer, of course. In this industry, there are three main categories of designers. First, I'm guessing at least half the designers in the U.S. are attached to an OEM. Maybe I'm just a bit naive, because I've spent my career on the contract side, but we interface with OEM designers on quite a few of our customers' projects. e designers oen interface with a small subset of fabricators and CEMs. On the contract side, we're working daily with different customers, a multitude of fab houses that we need to interface with, and different CEMs, so we have to be agile. ere are notice- able differences between these two designers, the largest of which is the pace. At an OEM, the work can be concentrated to hardware cycles and timelines. On the contract side, I'm work- ing on my next project before I'm finished with the previous one, and I maybe have two or three other smaller designs that I'm squeezing into review cycle times. e third group of design- ers are at startups, which tend to be in prototyping. ese organizations oen utilize contracted design help as pace is oen tar- geting concentrated time- to-market goals. Many hire on contractors for a more focused approach to their design needs. ese designers oen need to pri- oritize schedule over cost and design optimization or minimized technology. I remember the first time I went into a fab shop; it was a very eye-opening and nostril-opening experience. It changed how I looked at design. My first fab shop tour was at Multicircuits in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. eir capabilities were sufficient for most designs, but more limited in advanced technologies. e second shop was the TTM facility in Chippewa Falls. Talk about the two extremes: a smaller and more focused PCB shop and then a high-technology, com- plex shop. Seeing those two facilities up close really put the puzzle pieces together for me. Seeing the size and hearing the hum and cadence of a drill helped me understand how this process can realize the large number of drill hits in each design. Seeing and smelling the plating baths put to reality the chemical side of fabrication, how different finishes are realized, and why a fabricator may not be able to have a multitude Tony Bell