If you look at the way people have used FPGAs, they are a miracle product in many ways. -Mark Oliver

Our guest Mark Oliver, VP of marketing at Efinix talks about the evolving role of FPGAs in the industry beyond prototyping. Mark will give us a very insightful use of FPGA as an efficient custom silicon solution and will go deep on the importance of RISC-V for processor designs.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Introduction to Efinix, an FPGA company

• Mark starts off by addressing the inefficient ways designers use FPGAs and how this has helped them develop a product that can be utilized from prototyping and straight to high-volume manufacturing

• they  are designed as mid-volume production solutions with the potential for scalability

• What is RISC-V and why it is so important for processor design, specifically for FPGAs?

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Mark Oliver on LinkedIn

• How to Start an FPGA PCB Layout For Your Embedded System

• FPGA Pins Explained!

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Join us as we reflect on the best moments and the coolest guests we've had on the OnTrack podcast this year. 2012 has been a whirlwind year for the electronics industry–chip shortages, and a supply chain crunch. Altium has passed several milestones, as well as releasing an education program. And there have been some groundbreaking reports from industry groups highlighting the need for workforce training and development, and workforce shortages coming on the horizon.

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Show Highlights:

• One of Altium’s Milestone is the Altium Education Program

Links and Resources:

• Watch all the OnTrack Podcast Episode

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Young blood in the PCB industry, Christopher Bonsell talks about process engineering–the chemical involved in the PCB, etching and encouraging the young generation to the “cool-tech” aspects of PCB design and manufacturing.

Watch this episode through the end, and check the show notes and additional below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Chris Bonsell published articles on i-Connect007

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Christoper Bonsell on LinkedIn

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Let’s take a glimpse into a life of a young process engineer. In this episode, our guest Paige Fiet talks about her career path in the world of PCB manufacturing. She will also share how she landed her role as the Student Liaison in the IPC.

Watch this episode through the end or listen on the go. We hope to inspire young engineers to become more motivated to jump into the PCB industry.

Show Highlights:

• Paige shares her story and her exciting career path before she landed her role as a process engineer at TTM Technologies

• She also talks about how interested engineers can become involved in the IPC and encourage them to invest in a membership and attend other industry-related trade shows and conferences

Links and Resources:

• Connect with Paige on LinkedIn

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Visit Nexar website

Visit Octopart website

It’s that time again to have Altium’s VP of Marketing, Lawrence Romine, the bearer of good news when it comes to Altium Designer’s latest features. We will discuss what’s coming in Altium Designer 23 which includes multi-board and harness design capabilities.

You don’t want to miss this one. Watch through the end and be sure to check the show notes and additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights

• Altium Designer®’s regular and reliable updates are incomparable in the industry, stay on top of the monthly updates through the OnTrack newsletter

Links and Resources:

Connect with Lawrence Romine on LinkedIn

• Stay on top of Altium Designer versions updates

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Materials Science and how this can level up your PCB manufacturability.

In this episode, our guest Geoffrey Leeds the product manager at Insulectro talks about how material science can help solve the unique manufacturing challenges fabricators are dealing with HDI designs.

Listen through the end and check the additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Geoffrey Leed’s role as a product manager at Insulectro, a material science distributor

Links and Resources:

Connect with Geoffrey Leeds on LinkedIn

Follow Insulectro on LinkedIn

Visit Insulectro’s website here

Watch Related Episode: Mike Creeden on Empowering PCB Engineers through PCE-A

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Visit Nexar website

Visit Octopart website

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This is a very interesting episode, especially for hardware engineers. Duncan Haldane, the CEO, and co-founder of JITX joins us to share a very interesting approach to PCB design. JITX is a way for hardware engineers to write code to design circuit boards.

I know you are excited to hear more! Watch this episode or listen on the go. Be sure to check out the show notes and additional resources below.

Watch this episode here

Show Highlights:

• Duncan talks about the Series A funding from Sequoia Capital and the general availability of JITX as an actual product.

• They are building full automation for boards, new kinds of routing algorithms, new kinds of placement algorithms, and checks for physical geometry

• Zach and Duncan excitedly talked about AI, and how it can be used to drive some parameters to create new designs

Links and Resources:

Connect with Duncan Haldane on LinkedIn

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

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Electronic parts shortages coupled with inflation has been affecting the electronic industry globally. Chris Cain our guest for today’s episode is a supply chain consultant and former VP at Keysight working on supply chain and supply chain products.

Chris will share with us his 37 years of experience and strategies to overcome electronic part shortages.

Watch this episode here

Show Higlights:

• Chris Cain briefly describes what supply management is, and his role as a consultant.

• Find alternatives and make some design adjustments where is possible

• It pays to spend a little time keeping up with groups like IPC which does the groundwork of looking up the industry and what they think is coming

• Fuel costs push up the cost of everything else it's related to and it's essentially an inflation driver

Links and Resources:

Connect with Christopher Cain on LinkedIn

Connect with Zach on LinkedIn

Ben Nibali, founder and President of Aptus Design Works, with Connor Richardson, the Electrical Designer, are our guests in this episode. We will discuss how you can plan the cost and lead times to successfully launch your product in the market.

Ben and Connor share some excellent advice for designers and companies to streamline their product development process from prototyping to manufacturing.

Show Highlights:

• Aptus is a design and engineering company, and they’ve been around for about 15 years

• They handle initial concept development, mechanical development, controls, and mechanical prototyping and help their clients through the launching and manufacturing of their products

• Other challenges include expectations from not knowing the process and cost expectations based on the higher volume of current products that really can’t be met in a US market-based launch scenario

• You can’t have fast, cheap, and high quality at the same time

• The “minimum viable product” is a great idea and works exceptionally well in software because you can add, modify, change, and grow something slowly after you deploy. In hardware, it is an entirely different cost structure to make changes once you start making anything physical. 

• Another exciting prototype they created is the cow-milking robot

• The most important factor is market research, understanding what this thing that we're going to sell is? How are we going to sell it? Who's going to buy it? What features matter? 

Links and Resources:

Connect with Ben Nibali on LinkedIn

Matt Kelly is the  Chief Technologist at IPC. In this episode we will discuss all about the technological challenges the industry is facing. Matt will help us understand the “ecosystem” involving the semiconductor industry, advanced packaging, and IC substrates.

Watch this episode here

OR listen on the go!

Check the show notes and additional resources below.

Show Highlights:

• Matt Kelly’s role as the Chief Technologist at IPC

• Matt shares the same scenario with produce shoppers in the summertime, you try to buy your fresh fruits and vegetables locally from your local farmers or whatever, but yet you still go to the grocery store

• IPC is sponsoring the Advanced Packaging Symposium, Building the Substrate and Packaging Assembly Ecosystem in Washington, DC, on October 11th and 12th

Links and Resources:

Follow Matt Kelly on LinkedIn

Full OnTrack Podcast Library