EDA Tools and RF Design Techniques
April 14, 2025 | Andy Shaughnessy, Design007 MagazineEstimated reading time: 2 minutes

High-speed PCB design is complex enough, but RF design can be a whole new ball game. RF designers have to contend with tuning and other ideas that traditional PCB designers don’t have to worry about, as well as crosstalk, parasitic capacitance, and material limitations.
Most PCB design tool companies now offer RF design options, so designers no longer have to use pureplay RF design tools for anything but the most cutting-edge designs. Cadence Design Systems expanded its RF EDA offerings by acquiring the RF software company AWR a few years ago. We asked David Vye, product management director at Cadence, to share his thoughts on EDA software, RF design, and what new RF designers and engineers need to understand.
Andy Shaughnessy: David, what are the most common challenges facing PCB designers and EEs in the RF space today? So many electronic devices today have GPS, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi all together on the same PCB, and you wonder how they can all “play nice” with each other.
David Vye: For some time, many of the challenges that come with implementing RF technology in PCB systems relate to trends that have been evolving with each new communication standard. These system requirements (think 4G, 5G, and now 6G) include greater integration of functionality, reduction in footprint and power consumption, the move to higher frequencies and/or bandwidths, as well as the adoption of beamforming antennas to extend the system range. For the RF engineer, this leads to multiple technical considerations such as maintaining signal integrity, managing multiple high-frequency signals, ensuring proper impedance matching, and minimizing noise and interference, all while balancing performance, manufacturability, and space constraints. You’ve mentioned several different wireless standards; many of them exist together in a single device, serving a wide range of applications and consumer preferences for speed, quality of service, battery life, and the lowest possible cost.
Fitting multiple radio front ends into the smallest possible form factor requires smart layout strategies, proper shielding to prevent high-frequency signals from coupling to sensitive traces, a solid understanding of performance vs. cost trade-offs pertaining to component selection, and an awareness of non-RF issues such as thermal and stress-related effects that can impact the reliability of a PCB-based system. These considerations can be addressed with design and simulation software that provides insight into optimal system architecture and component selection via budget analysis, PCB passive component design capabilities through RF circuit simulation, and design verification through electromagnetic and thermal analyses. To reduce design turnaround times, these capabilities offer the greatest benefit when they are tied into a layout platform that offers a constraint-driven PCB design approach, which emphasizes defining design intent through rules for electrical, physical, and manufacturing aspects, ensuring first-pass success and streamlining the design process.
To read this entire conversation, which appeared in the April 2025 issue of Design007 Magazine, click here.
Suggested Items
CE3S Launches EcoClaim Solutions to Simplify Recycling and Promote Sustainable Manufacturing
05/29/2025 | CE3SCumberland Electronics Strategic Supply Solutions (CE3S), your strategic sourcing, professional solutions and distribution partner, is proud to announce the official launch of EcoClaim™ Solutions, a comprehensive recycling program designed to make responsible disposal of materials easier, more efficient, and more accessible for manufacturers.
WellPCB, OurPCB Launch Low-Cost PCB Assembly and Custom Cable Assembly Solutions
05/29/2025 | ACCESSWIREWellPCB and OurPCB, world leading PCB manufacturing service providers, announced today that they have officially launched new Low-Cost PCB Assembly Solutions and Custom Cable Assembly services to meet the needs of the electronics manufacturing industry for high cost performance and flexible customization.
Siemens Expands OSAT Alliance Membership to Build Domestic Semiconductor Supply Chains
05/29/2025 | SiemensSiemens Digital Industries Software announced the latest members to join its OSAT Alliance program which enables outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) providers to develop, validate and support integrated circuit (IC) package assembly design kits (ADKs) that drive broader adoption of emerging technologies by fabless semiconductor and systems companies and help to build secure domestic semiconductor supply chains.
Standards: The Roadmap for Your Ideal Data Package
05/29/2025 | Andy Shaughnessy, Design007 MagazineIn this interview, IPC design instructor Kris Moyer explains how standards can help you ensure that your data package has all the information your fabricator and assembler need to build your board the way you designed it, allowing them to use their expertise. As Kris says, even with IPC standards, there’s still an art to conveying the right information in your documentation.
High-frequency EMC Noise in DC Circuits
05/29/2025 | Karen Burnham, EMC UnitedEMC isn’t black magic, but it’s easy to understand why it seems that way. When looking at a schematic like that in Figure 1, it looks like you’re only dealing with DC signals all across the board. There’s a 28 VDC input that goes through an EMI filter, then gets converted to 12 VDC power. Except in extremely rare circumstances involving equipment sensitive to magnetostatic fields, DC electricity will never be part of an EMC problem.