Wescon Highlights Automated Design Software for Electronics
 
Copyright (c) 1989, McGraw-Hill, Inc.
SAN FRANCISCO (Microbytes Daily News Service) --- While computer
resellers and buyers are mobbing Las Vegas to see new end-user
hardware and software products at Comdex, some 40,000 designers
and engineers are here at the IEEE's Wescon exhibition to see the
latest electronics products and software tools that can help
design and manufacture those end-user products.
 
This year at Wescon, there is a strong focus on automated design
software, which breaks down into two primary categories:
electronic design automation (EDA), used from development and
simulation stages through actual manufacturing of an electronics
or computer system, and printed circuit board design.
 
While PCB design software has been around for several years, EDA
software, which includes simulation and logic synthesis
components, is an emerging segment of the electronic design
software market. There's an analogy between the development of
electronic design software and that of computer-aided design
programs for architecture and engineering, which began with basic
building layout and design programs and now provides tools for
going from conceptual drawings all the way to materials
specification and final construction. Similarly, electronic
design software started with basic PCB design and is now
including more sophisticated capabilities such as auto-routing,
logic synthesis, and simulation.
 
A large exhibit section called the Automated Design Center
features some 75 vendors who are showing EDA and PCB software.
There were only a handful of companies exhibiting these types of
products at last year's Wescon in Anaheim. This year there's also
a working exhibit of commercially available automated design
tools; it shows visitors the complete design cycle using products
from several vendors networked into a single system.
 
Most of the products on display are based on IBM PCs and
compatibles, which are now powerful enough to compete with the
workstation-based electronic design market. Companies exhibiting
include CAD Software, OrCAD Systems, Racal-Redac, and Applied
Microsystems.
 
                              --- Nick Baran
 
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