Zuken Brings AI Updates to Flagship PCB CAD Systems

Zuken recently announced updates to its flagship PCB design software packages, CR-8000 Design Gateway and Design Force. The updates are centered around speeding the design process, improving design integrity, and easing the burden that comes with increasingly complex high-speed, high-density electronics design.

CR-8000 updates cover all aspects of circuit design and layout. 

Design Gateway is the engineering front end for schematic design. The update brings a library of standard circuits, connection auto-generation, and validation automation. Design Force covers printed circuit board (PCB) layout and manufacturing file generation, and comes with artificial intelligence (AI) and other PCB routing enhancements.

In both packages, the updates use improved artificial intelligence (AI) design capability and non-AI automation features. The end result is a set of software that automates mundane tasks and repetitive activities and gives confidence to automation functionality.

Key Improvements in Schematic and Layout

Both schematic design and PCB layout have dramatically increased in complexity in recent years. Speeds are increasing across the board, and device ubiquity is leading to miniaturization and higher density requirements. Zuken designed these new software updates to address these needs head-on. Zuken calls out ten key feature improvements in the update.

1. Advanced constraint propagation for timing, skew, and delay constraints, passed between Design Gateway (schematics) and Design Force (layout)
2. Automated rules-based placement of decoupling capacitors with respect to power integrity constraints
3. Meshplane and via management for improved signal characteristics and board manufacturability
4. Real-time delay and skew visualization for speed and timing critical PCB traces
5. Component lifespan validation based on operating conditions, with special consideration for electrolytic capacitors
6. Power IC checks to validate input/output voltages and thermal parameters
7. AI-assisted placement and routing to reduce the workload and guesswork with high pin-count ICs, reduce layout time, and better utilize PCB space
8. Simulation support in the constraint browser to better interface with simulation software
9. Improved collaboration with advanced multi-board and 3D co-design capabilities
10. Stronger PLM integration and version control with bidirectional synchronization between CR-8000 and third-party tools

Below, we'll elaborate on some of these important updates. 

Standard Circuits and Design Blocks

CR-8000 Design Gateway now offers improved automated circuit generation. This feature takes care of standard and housekeeping-type tasks such as generating connectors for unconnected pins and adding pull-up/down resistors and bypass capacitors. It can add standard circuit element blocks such as RC filters and ESD protection. The software can also utilize pre-defined circuit blocks, such as a unique power management circuit or communications interface required in multiple designs.

AI and Automation Enhancements

Circuit Adviser is a rule-based verification engine feature of CR-8000 Design Gateway that has been upgraded for automated validation risk checking. Risk checking involves using design rules to predict the potential for common insidious risks, such as thermal problems or components exceeding their design specifications.

The new CR-8000 Design Gateway enables rule-based thermal, electrical, and lifespan validation for faster, more reliable designs. 

It also improves IC power analysis from the previous version. While all of these capabilities are important with critical designs, they take a considerable amount of time away from the designer. By automating the tasks, the engineer can concentrate on the project with the confidence afforded by an automated, real-time design review.

Autorouter Streamlines Routing

Turning to the PCB routing package, CR-8000 Design Force's auto routing and routing assist now have big improvements, too. Zuken relies heavily on AI for both auto routing and guided manual routing capabilities of the layout package. The router considers delays in real-time, shows skew visualizations, and considers topology.

CR-8000 Design Force provides AI and automation assistance for complex tasks such as real-time delay routing and other improvements. 

These features will deliver great benefits to high-speed communications routing for subsystems such as DDRX memory and the latest PCIe interfacing. AI-based component placement and assistance for high pin-count packages significantly reduce layout time from the get-started phase to layout completion.

Getting Hands-On Experience With the Update

The updated versions are now available through Zuken’s global support portal. Zuken also offers guided evaluations, interactive support, and periodic “experience days” for expert-led training and demonstration sessions.

All images used courtesy of Zuken.