IPC International Community magazine an association member publication
Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1543955
MARCH 2026 I I-CONNECT007 MAGAZINE 107 Day 2: The Shift to Agentic AI The pace of Day 1 was non-stop, and Day 2 proved just as strong. As soon as the activity timer hit 8 a.m., the conference sprang to life. Aisles between the meeting rooms and tutorial ballrooms were filled with a steady stream of attendees. It also appeared that many who were delayed by early travel disrup- tions finally made it to California. I heard several stories of rerouted flights and last-minute airport changes. Gary "Kaken" Lytle from the Cadence team described quite the journey: shoveling snow, enduring six canceled flights, and nearly giving up before hitch- ing a ride with passing snowmobilers who dropped him at an open airport two hours north. I spotted him on the show floor later, energized and none the worse for wear. Previewing the morning's tutorial lineup, I counted no fewer than 84 offerings on Wednesday alone. The range of topics is too extensive to list here, but they're all easily accessible through the DesignCon show planner app. The day's keynote, "Agentic AI for Chip Design," was presented by Mark Ren, founder of Agentrys. Ren described a shift from simple AI assistants— copilots—to agentic AI: autonomous systems capable of reasoning, using tools, and executing complex workflows with minimal human interven- tion. Modern chips, he explained, have grown too complex for humans to optimize manually at scale. Agentic AI is essential to sustaining the industry's rapid innovation cycles by automating the most tedious and resource-intensive aspects of design. The themes of this unique show, held during uniquely challenging times, invite reflection. The physical challenges faced daily by the average DesignCon attendee, whether in an office, lab, or research institute, revolve around mastering forces we often cannot see. As I scanned the keynote au- dience or moved with the "herd" toward the next class or the bustling exhibit hall, I was struck by how the language of electronics shapes not only our work, but our shared experience. Electronic performance depends on our ability to understand, measure, and control energy, something fundamentally invisible. There are many levels of mastery in the theories that help us navigate this un- seen world, and yet we're all here to keep learning. Regardless of our level of expertise, we all rec- ognize the terms that define our discipline, and, in many ways, the journey that brought us here: resis- tance, modulation, speed, noise, isolation, tariffs, adaptivity, time, and mitigation. The struggle is real, but the payoff is great. I-CONNECT007 Kelly Dack is an expert PCB designer and trainer with a long history in the industry. He is a senior application engineer at Pioneer Circuits in Southern California and an I-Connect007 columnist.