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26 The PCB Design Magazine • April 2016 point the PCB designer essentially drives the physical design. I think that to be effective in this role it helps to have a working knowledge of signal integrity, power integrity, and RF and analogue layout techniques. In my experience, I have found that in larger companies, there is a level of specialization for engineers; this tends not to be the case for PCB designers so they are "au fait" with multiple disciplines. The PCB designer should also keep up with the latest technologies for components, board fab and assembly. Shaughnessy: Some PCB design tools are mar- keted directly to the design engineer, not the PCB designer. Do you think PCB designers are being squeezed out? Critcher: In general the answer is no; in my experience I find that this may be practical for smaller design teams or for less complex PCB layout, but when the design is either mixed- technology (RF, digital and analogue) or a complex layout with large component and net counts, a dedicated PCB designer is the most successful solution. There are a number of reasons why I think this. Firstly, it is NOT that the engineer is not capable of performing the layout task, but more with regard to the pressures on design teams to deliver on time to meet the time-to-market re- quirements most design teams need to parallel as many tasks as possible, layout included. Further to this, the schematic is generally a living document that evolves as the layout proceeds due to marketing requirements or simulation results, etc.—the engineer cannot perform two discrete tasks at the same time— to maximize the time efficiency of the design team as a whole separating the two tasks makes sense. On a practical side, the electronic engineer- ing teams are generally split via the design dis- ciplines already mentioned—RF, analogue and digital—would this mean that each engineer would take it in turns to layout their section? The PCB tool set is a complicated environ- ment; although the new breed of tools provide ways to support the entry of the complex data sets such as constraints, the complexity contin- ues to increase ahead of the tools. Essentially the environments are not really for the casual user. The automation of the applications in- creases but the need to enter the constraint data and drive the tool successfully requires the user to use the toolset day-in and day-out to be ef- ficient. In many instances the engineer could spend a few weeks to over a month away from the tools themselves as they test and commis- sion the PCBs. Another area that the PCB designer has a certain amount of experience is in the actual fabrication and assembly process; this is gener- ally accumulated over a number of years work- ing with these disciplines. Pre-preg suitability etc., all goes into the pot. The PCB designer spends a lot of time taking input from different engineers and this helps hone their skill set; taking input from multiple sources helps the designer solve future prob- lems by being able to draw on the gathered ex- perience from the different sources. In the same way that many companies have a dedicated signal integrity team, the idea of a dedicated PCB makes sense for the same reason. Shaughnessy: With more and more engineers do- ing PCB design work (half of the attendees at some PCB design and layout classes are electronics en- gineers), what do you think is the solution to this friction? Critcher: I think that the solution to the fric- tion is communication, integration and pa- Designers anD Design engineers: tWo siDes of the same coin " In many instances the engineer could spend a few weeks to over a month away from the tools themselves as they test and commission the PCBs. "