September 15, 2011 ? Munich, Germany and Westford, MA, USA ? Zuken today announces a new system-level design environment for up-front planning and partitioning of electronics systems, called System Planner. This solution enables engineers to optimize form, fit and function of single and multi-board systems, maximizing design reuse and eliminating the need to reenter initial planning data into the design tools during detailed design. System Planner has been shown to reduce design throughput time by as much as 30% in companies who have adopted it in their design process.

“System Planner is a solution that can link our new product planning tasks together. It will save time and improve the connectivity of our data during circuit development, design reuse, layout and mechanical packaging,” says Jerry Murray, PCB Design Team leader at Cummins Power Generation.

Zuken’s System Planner is used at the beginning of the design process where requirements are implemented in practical product designs. This is the stage where a product is configured and crucial design decisions are made, such as how many boards are in the system and what functions are on each board. The user can simultaneously work on the tasks of BOM planning, functional planning, floor planning and space planning; steps that were once disconnected are now intelligently brought together in one view to optimize the product planning phase. System Planner feeds all of these details into Zuken’s schematic, PCB layout and manufacturing tools, saving time and effort throughout the entire design process.

System Planner Modules

System Planner’s four main modules work together or standalone, and may appear individually or simultaneously on the screen for real-time interaction with each other. When one view is changed, the others automatically update.

• Logical Visionary ? the logical view of the electronic system is defined using functional blocks and design reuse blocks, showing the interconnections between them. Partitioning is accomplished as blocks are dragged and dropped from this view onto the various boards in the system using the Physical Visionary.
• Physical Visionary ? simultaneous 2D PCB partitioning and floor planning for single or multiple boards. Blocks are dragged and dropped from the Logical Visionary, forming the placement plan for each board and optimizing the design partitions through trade-offs and what-ifs.
• Geometric Visionary ? accesses the 3D view of the product, permitting the fit of the boards to be checked in the overall system. The enclosure is imported from the 3D MCAD system.
• Parametric Visionary ? shows parametric values of the components, nets, and other elements in the design, allowing the user to optimize part usage, cost, availability and more.

Data and Design Reuse

There are many ways to reuse data throughout the design process with System Planner. Design reuse can be employed from an existing library of reuse modules or by cutting and pasting design sections from existing known-good designs for use and/or modification in the current design, helping to save time and increase product quality.

For more information on System Planner visit www.zuken.com/systemplanner