PLM system requirements and management in EDA fiel

PLM system requirements and management in EDA

understanding PLM

Product Life Cycle Management PLM is a broad concept including product information management, in which product 2 and after-sales service information include all the processes from the production to the end of the product, including initial market definition, design, prototype, manufacturing, sales and after-sales service. PLM system is not a single

data management system. It is a collection of many systems and tools

the main data in PLM system is the necessary document for product manufacturing. Usually, at least include the production drawings of the manufactured products, List of raw materials and purchased parts (typically included in the material list {BOM}) 。 There is usually some additional information, such as operation instructions for some special processing in the manufacturing process, which is also included

with the change of time, some changes will be made to the product when correcting product problems or product upgrading. The details of the modification process must be recorded to ensure consistency with the supply and manufacturing process

from the data associated with PLM, the direct quantity source should be the design data, including the design data of mechanical part, electronic part and software code. (as shown in Figure 1)

Figure 1 PLM system

development history of PLM application

current PLM manufacturers and systems originate from the mechanical design industry. From the initial manual drawing to the development of computer and the emergence of computer aided design (CAD), it is possible to digitize the engineering drawing and control it on the computer. In the early 1980s, EDA industry rose. At this time, traditional CAD companies tried to enter the EDA market from the perspective of mechanical design, but found it difficult to compete with professional EDA companies in the field of electronic design. Today, despite many attempts, all mechanical CAD companies do not have a successful EDA product. The main reason for their failure in this new market is their lack of expertise in the field of electronic design. Because there are fundamental differences between electronic data and mechanical data in type and complexity, it is impossible to apply mechanical based tools and technologies in the field of EDA

therefore, most PLM manufacturers today have a good performance in managing MCAD design and data. They basically have the integration function of MCAD tools, and other functions are becoming more and more perfect, such as project management, knowledge management and gradually adding digital manufacturing solutions. However, for EDA design and design data management, the current PLM system does not have a good solution

the demand for PLM in EDA design field

EDA design field is different from mechanical design field. Generally, there is a specific design process, from the schematic design of the front end to the PCB design of the back end. The typical electronic design environment is composed of multiple tools from multiple manufacturers. In extreme cases, due to the different application tools, different data management systems are needed to support. When trying to understand and control the data of the whole electronic design combination, this inconsistency requires a customized data management scheme

some of the large ECAD manufacturers have developed basic data management tools to support their customers. If your design tool process is mainly composed of tools from a single manufacturer, you can use the tools provided by these manufacturers as the basic library management and design data management scheme. Unfortunately, the vast majority of systems cannot support the mixed process of multiple manufacturers, nor can they easily connect other data sources of the enterprise and bring the information of these external systems to the designer's desktop. In addition, design has become more and more complex, and the design team has become a global team. To improve the productivity of the team, more and more experts will be required to work together, which also puts forward higher and higher requirements for collaborative work

for EDA design engineering, the system needs to be able to provide the following two aspects:

· provide designers with necessary information to make optimal design decisions

· in the design stage, manage and control design information to ensure data integrity

through these two steps, collaborative design is possible, so as to balance global resources and improve the overall efficiency in the process of product development

because design decisions have a great impact on supply chain problems affecting cost, reliability and product manufacturing efficiency, it is very important to ensure that the design team has access to product related information

this information is usually about the device. Moreover, design engineers need to understand the technical details of devices in order to make correct design decisions, but they usually also need to understand business-related details. For example, a component effectiveness problem, that is, whether it is an approved device, whether it is a preferred device, whether there are alternative suppliers, and other factors such as cost, safety, environmental grade, etc

however, this information is not easy for designers to obtain. Usually they are included in various commercial systems and cannot be obtained by designers. And these information are exchanged through meetings, emails, etc. such communication is easy to lead to errors, and will lead to information loss or data errors

for companies that have already used PLM system, if these information cannot be integrated with system tools, users have to retrieve these information in different systems, and then select appropriate devices from the company's standard parts library. It is very inconvenient to use, and there is no convenient correlation check

for the field of electronic design, the current PLM system provides some of its required features: for example, it can create and manage the life cycle of objects, assign roles, save the design data in a reliable place to ensure data integrity, manage the design data with version and provide permission control based on Roles and life cycle status. However, a key requirement of electronic design for PLM system is the ability to manage these data at a more detailed level than the current PLM system actually does

EDA library management

when developing high-quality electronic products, managing the design library of EDA tools is a key task. Not only is the EDA design library more complex than the corresponding MCAD library, but also with the merger of the company, the EDA library environment becomes more complex: we have to face multiple design libraries managing different tool processes and different ECAD suppliers. The difficulty of maintaining these branch libraries across different regions and different methods of EDA management may make it more difficult to span different regions

tasks of a typical ECAD Library:

maintain a protected central library

control the creation and synchronization of a globally distributed enterprise's design library

manage a variety of EDA tools from multiple suppliers

provide a controlled design library management process

ensure the availability of the company's quality assets

automatically create EDA design library

handle different manufacturing processes, It is one of the most important events for the design of a new electronic product to ensure that the correct design library

device information management

is used for different manufacturing processes. Because this choice will affect the cost and reliability of the new design. This is a far-reaching decision-making process, which requires designers to consider the following issues:

cost constraints

whether the required devices can be purchased from suppliers

meet the environmental and regulatory requirements (such as RoHS, WEEE)

device aging, and confirm that the devices are not close to waste

these are the factors affecting designers' choice. The wrong choice in the early stage will ruin all the original advantages, delay the listing of products and reduce profits

typical tasks of component information management include:

providing technology, environment, Logistics and supply chain information

Manage processing data form

give designers decision support in the design process

track the life cycle information of devices

and design are undoubtedly great business opportunity tools. Direct integration

provide a complete view of a meta device in EDA design library

Manage interchangeable devices and confirmed processing data

2006, The new environmental policy (RoHS & WEEE) aimed at reducing and eliminating hazardous materials in electronic products will come into force in Europe. Companies need to manage the data of hazardous materials to ensure that the final products meet the new standards. This requires mandatory integration of device information system and design process

design data management

it is an increasingly important challenge to effectively manage design projects and enhance teamwork. In a high-tech electronic design, because the new concept needs to complete the test, simulation and analysis, and the results should be neutralized into the design, it is necessary to have a lot of repetition in the design process. In addition, multiple designers will be involved in the design process, and the work will be subdivided and coordinated by team members distributed everywhere

two key aspects of design data management are:

· manage the design files created by different tools in the design process

· track the typical design tasks of intermediate version

design data management

· cross regional team cooperation

· manage the repetition of the design process and track the design increment

· improve the design reuse in the design group

WIP_ BOM management

BOM is one of the most important information managed in each PLM system. Each PLM system usually has its own method of processing BOM. Basically, a BOM represents the product structure, but there are many different descriptions of the product structure. Some examples of BOMs include:

derived BOMs, derived design BOMs

main BOMs, derived design main BOMs, including all sub BOMs

structure BOMs, logical level BOMs of product structure

Design BOMs, which mainly complete the logical functions of design. Compared with production BOMs, specific manufacturers have not been determined

production BOMs, and specific manufacturers' BOMs can be directly used for back-end production and processing

the BOM formed in the design process is incomplete and needs to be changed frequently. We call it WIP BOM (work in progress BOM). Typical tasks of WIP BOM management:

extraction and release management of WIP BOM management

cost and environment statistics

release constraint Review

derived design management

BOM analysis and "where used" search

design collaboration

many large companies will face the division of labor and cooperation between multiple development teams in different regions, as well as cooperation with manufacturers and external partners. These collaborations are very important, and many collaborations begin at the beginning of the project, when there is no appropriate project design data for PLM

typical tasks of design collaboration:

querying devices and design information through the web

collaboration of design changes

publishing BOM to EMS or other partners

PLM system expansion in EDA field

as mentioned above, the current PLM system is generally developed from the machinery industry, and it is impossible to deeply grasp the data design characteristics of EDA industry, such as library management, production process, etc. Therefore, it is impossible to go deep into the details of EDA design for management. For example, although BOM can also be extracted, it is impossible to grasp the information at the pad level

for the current data management of EDA design, the design engineer is generally responsible for the design