Optimize PCB Design with Integrated BOM and CAD Systems

Until recently, PCB design software and supply chain software were kept perpetually separated. You created your product in your PCB design software suite, and then you took your exported Bill of Materials (BOM) to your procurement department to buy parts. How anyone selected parts and ensured availability is a mystery at this point because the CAD systems of the past had no ability to be supply chain aware.

Fast forward to today, and you'll find professional PCB design software is highly integrated with the supply chain, as well as other design tools for different engineering disciplines. Bringing all of these capabilities together under one roof has caused individual designers and PCB design teams to change their workflows, ultimately becoming more efficient and eliminating sourcing problems earlier in design cycles.

What process should you use to take advantage of integrated CAD and BOM management systems? I'll show you how in this article.

Be Supply Chain Aware Early

Rewind 20-plus years, and you would have found designers searching for parts out of a paper catalog. There was no way to know whether those parts were actually in stock, obsolete, or NRND (Not Recommended for New Designs) until you called a distributor to place an order. Fast forward to today, and the magic of the internet allows us to link distributor inventory numbers directly to your PCB libraries.

Now that we can get all of this data directly inside of a CAD tool, what steps can you take to make sure your design timelines stay on schedule and on budget? You will need to:

• Identify and eliminate obsolete components from your designs
• Make sure components are sourceable at your required volume
• Track sudden price changes that could break your production budget

To do this, we believe you should be supply chain aware early in your design process. Instead of selecting ideal parts and hoping they are available, verify this early with a link to distributor data directly inside your PCB design software. Altium Designer does this with three important tools:

• Supplier links inside your component library
• Supplier data inside the Manufacturer Part Search panel
• Supplier data inside your BOM in ActiveBOM

Although it takes a bit of setup in your component libraries when you create parts, you can instantly see distributor inventory while browsing parts in your library. This overcomes the first aspect of optimizing PCB design: balancing inventory and cost against your design’s required capabilities. Pick the chips that provide the required capabilities, but make sure your BOM hits your cost and production volume targets before finalizing a design.

Once the Design is Complete: Scan the BOM

Ideally you have identified the main parts to replace in your design before completing the PCB layout. But there still needs to be a final review of the design before releasing the PCB for production. At this point, procurement managers normally step in and will need to see the BOM before the design is released for quote. While a supplier link in your component libraries keeps PCB designers supply-chain aware, this does not really help procurement managers when they need to see information in the BOM.

The BOM Portal in Altium 365 is the ideal tool for procurement managers who need to access a BOM, review inventories, spot obsolete/EOL/NRND parts, and forecast pricing for an upcoming production run. The BOM Portal leverages direct connections to distributors to instantly update your project’s BOM to reflect the latest pricing, inventory, and lifecycle data for your project.

Doing this final review in the cloud before sending a design off for quote allows non-EEs to be part of the design and approval process. Procurement managers, project managers, and even customers can be part of the process and get full visibility into the supply chain for a project. This means outstanding parts problems can be identified and solved faster, helping designers stay on budget and on schedule.

Review the BOM (Often!)

Whenever you’re designing electronics, you’ll go through multiple rounds of design reviews. Of the many reviews I’ve been involved with over the years, no one ever reviews the BOM for sourcing problems, and yet the BOM will be one of  the biggest sources of redesigns. Many redesigns could be benign part number changes, but sometimes a redesign requirement due to zero-stock of a required component, sudden pricing changes, or lifecycle changes.

If you want to get these changes in front of your team early, plan to perform a BOM review at key phases in the design cycle. A BOM review is not as onerous as one might think because today’s integrated BOM and CAD systems enable an instant BOM review, specifically for the supply chain issues I highlighted above.

• Learn more about a BOM review process

By the time your team is ready to make purchases, most of the major problems that create time delays in PCB component sourcing and manufacturing will have already been addressed. Catching these problems in your BOM and your CAD data early will help your company stay on schedule and on budget. If you're ready to learn more, open up your Altium 365 workspace and give the BOM Portal feature a try. We think you'll experience a seamless transition to a new workflow that expands your reach and capabilities.