KLA Moves PCB Design-for-Manufacturability Analysis to the Cloud

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KLA Corporation announced the launch of Frontline Cloud Services, a software solution that accelerates design-for-manufacturability (DFM) analysis and time-to-market (TTM) for complex printed circuit boards (PCBs). Advanced technologies, such as 5G and miniLED, call for PCBs with increasingly complex designs that require time-consuming, compute-intensive validation for manufacturability. This new cloud-based SaaS  offering – an industry first – addresses this challenge by moving DFM analysis to the cloud, which significantly reduces IT bottlenecks and the amount of time needed to run analyses.

An on-premises DFM analysis can often take hours or even days, causing considerable delays in the mass production of PCBs for the electronics industry. To accelerate this process, KLA is transitioning its proven computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) and engineering technologies to the cloud, where compute power is virtually infinite.

"As a leader in PCB CAM, engineering and Industry 4.0 solutions, our customers share with us the bottlenecks that slow down their PCB manufacturing process," said Eran Lazar, general manager, Frontline division, and vice president at KLA. "We decided to tackle the challenges of DFM analysis by taking advantage of the unlimited computational power of the cloud, while keeping the proven application intact. For PCB manufacturers eager to make the most of cloud-based efficiencies while maintaining exacting security protocols, we continually ensure that Frontline Cloud Services meets the highest security standards."

Anecdotally, customers running comparative tests on complex PCBs saw Frontline Cloud Services  enable up to 90% faster DFM analysis speeds. For example, one customer producing high-density interconnect (HDI) PCBs saw analysis time significantly shorten from 75 hours to 30 minutes when running the same DFM analysis on premises versus with Frontline Cloud Services, respectively. Another customer producing PCBs for miniLED ran a similar test and analysis time was reduced from nine hours to 20 minutes.

For PCB manufacturers, Frontline Cloud Services can: 

• Accelerate DFM analysis to meet growing productivity demands
• Save on IT costs with scalable compute resources and monitored usage reports
• Address emerging electronics trends like 5G and miniLED, and their increased design complexity
• Provide access to consistently reliable, available and up-to-date services and tools
• Ensure the highest cloud security standards in the industry with both factory- and job-level security
• Enable fast onboarding to the cloud-based system with no training or implementation required