SAN DIEGO -- Altium today said a new cloud infrastructure that facilitates better, more connected collaboration across all design and product realization disciplines will be rolled out this winter.
Altium 365 directly connects desktop printed circuit board (PCB) design with the manufacturing floor. The cloud-based platform is scheduled to be available in December.
Altium 365 integrates with the company's CAD tool, Altium Designer 19, using a cloud-based architecture to connect designers, component distributors, and manufacturing stakeholders. According to the company, it makes it easy and convenient to share information and design collaboratively.
The CAD vendor made the announcement at its AltiumLive user conference this week.
Altium 365 allows designers to share working schematics and 3-D board designs with manufacturers who can comment and markup designs in real time using only a web browser. This accelerates the process of going from design concept to manufactured board, Altium said. Ultimately, the company hopes to provide designers with real-time feedback on the manufacturability of their designs directly from manufacturing equipment.
“Today I have to release a design in flat files, spreadsheets, and images, send it to a manufacturer, and wait two days to get something back — in yet another format — that tells me how to adjust my design so that they can build it,” said Jeremy Blum, director of hardware, Shaper Tools. “And for every design I generally have to do that three or four times.”
Altium 365 is said to facilitate the synchronization of product design and manufacturing. Designers can share any design with a manufacturing partner, and that partner can interact with the design from any device, on any operating system, and guide the designer towards choices that will assure that the board is manufacturable.
Component pricing and availability is another common issue that slows product development. “Everyone who designs has experienced selecting a part that literally seems to disappear from every distributor in the world when they send it to be manufactured,” said Blum. “That forces you to make more changes and waste more time.”
In response, Altium 365 uses the company's Octopart system to provide a live connection between the manufacturing bill of materials (BoM) and component data, to help guide designers toward using parts that meet cost, availability, and lead-time constraints.
“This is an important - but only first - step toward delivering on our vision for helping to transform the electronics industry,” said Ted Pawela, chief operating officer, Altium. “Altium 365 will ultimately provide direct, real-time connectivity between design, supply chain, and the people and equipment on the manufacturing floor to achieve this.”
With initial release targeted for December, Altium 365 provides a number of software-based services, accessed seamlessly through Altium Designer or from any web browser. These services include design-to-manufacturing collaboration, live component supply-chain information, library management, and ECAD/MCAD co-design. Altium 365 also provides a simplified means to manage Altium product licenses, subscriptions and users.
Altium has also announced the upcoming release of its PCB design software, Altium Designer. Altium Designer 19 adds performance and reliability enhancements including a new 3-D design engine, basic MCAD capabilities, and more.
Altium Designer 19 also brings important new capabilities including high-speed design features, improved routing, and microvia support.
