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Beyond the Rulebook
What happens when the rule book is no longer useful, or worse, was never written in the first place? In today’s fast-moving electronics landscape, we’re increasingly asked to design and build what has no precedent, no proven path, and no tidy checklist to follow. This is where “Design for Invention” begins.
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From the growing role of AI in design tools to the challenge of managing cumulative tolerances, these articles in this issue examine the technical details, design choices, and manufacturing considerations that determine whether a board works as intended.
Looking Forward to APEX EXPO 2026
I-Connect007 Magazine previews APEX EXPO 2026, covering everything from the show floor to the technical conference. For PCB designers, we move past the dreaded auto-router and spotlight AI design tools that actually matter.
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EMA Acquires Accelerated Designs for its Extensive Part Library and Expertise
August 3, 2016 | EMA Design AutomationEstimated reading time: 2 minutes
EMA Design Automation has acquired Accelerated Designs, a company known for its dominance in EDA part library content and solutions including a 7.2-million-part database and its specialist library tool Ultra Librarian.
“One of the many challenges an electrical engineer faces during the design phase is getting accurate and usable symbols and footprints,” said Manny Marcano, president of EMA Design Automation. “Accelerated Designs’ library is the world’s largest library for EDA symbols and footprints, offering over 7.2 million quality parts to choose from. Additionally, Accelerated Designs offers services to enable any IC vendor to quickly and easily create the EDA library content its customers need when choosing their components.”
The acquisition includes all EDA content and software created by Accelerated Designs. “We also hired all of Accelerated Designs’ existing personnel, both to retain their expertise and so that existing Accelerated Designs’ customers will experience a business-as-usual transition through the change in ownership,” said Marcano.
“Becoming part of EMA allows me and my team to focus on our core expertise: EDA part creation, library tools, and services,” said Frank Frank, president and CEO of Accelerated Designs. “With EMA’s help in marketing and business development, we’ll be able to expand our offerings and provide more value to our customers.”
In addition to the existing library of parts, Accelerated Designs’ Ultra Librarian tool speeds the creation of EDA content for new components. The tool uses the concept of templates to create parts, which increases accuracy, speed, and consistency of part creation and allows global changes to be made to a library. Automation is the key component to the Ultra Librarian tool, allowing a user to build their component accurately one time and then export it to the CAD tool(s) of their choice.
“Digi-Key partnered with Accelerated Designs in 2015 to provide the unique ability to generate symbols and footprints in the specific format for nearly any EDA tool,” said Randall Restle, Digi-Key vice-president of applications engineering. “This allows our customers to quickly and easily design in new parts or even obtain customized libraries from a pool of hundreds of thousands of Digi-Key’s parts, indexed with a Digi-Key part number, and compatible with their EDA tool. Our successful history with both EMA and Accelerated Designs encourages me that the combination will be a positive change for Digi-Key and our customers.”
Symbol and Footprint generation has always been a void in the market. EDA vendors have largely ignored it as they need to focus on the features of the EDA toolset. “EMA now owns a tremendous wealth of symbol and footprint content, and my goal is to rapidly evolve the Accelerated Designs library to be the ‘Gold Standard’ for the EDA industry,” said Marcano.
About EMA Design Automation, Inc.
EMA Design Automation is a trailblazer in product development solutions offering a complete range of EDA tools, product lifecycle management systems, services, training, and technical support. EMA is a Cadence® Channel Partner serving all of North America. EMA manufactures TimingDesigner®, CircuitSpace®, and a host of custom solutions to enhance the OrCAD products, and all are distributed through a worldwide network of value added resellers. EMA is a privately held corporation headquartered in Rochester, New York. Visit EMA at ema-eda.com for more information.
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04/16/2026 | BUSINESS WIRETeradyne, Inc., a leading provider of automated test equipment (ATE) and advanced robotics, announced it has acquired TestInsight, a leading provider of semiconductor test development, validation, and conversion software widely used across the industry.
Cadence, Google Scale AI Chip Design with ChipStack on Google Cloud
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ESD Alliance Reports Electronic System Design Industry Posts $5.5 Billion in Revenue in Q4 2025
04/15/2026 | SEMIElectronic System Design (ESD) industry revenue increased 10.3% to $5,466.3 million in the fourth quarter of 2025 from the $4,955.2 million registered in the fourth quarter of 2024, the ESD Alliance, a SEMI Technology Community, announced today in its latest Electronic Design Market Data (EDMD) report.
April Issue of I-Connect007 Magazine: Beyond the Rulebook
04/14/2026 | I-Connect007 Editorial TeamIn this month’s I-Connect007 Magazine, we asked PCB designers, fabricators, and suppliers what it really means to operate without a rulebook. Their perspectives vary, especially between seasoned designers and experienced fabricators, but a common thread emerges: progress depends on pushing boundaries and finding a way forward, even when the path isn’t clear. In many ways, this mindset has always been part of what we do, whether we’ve called it that or not.
Powering the Future: Why Thermal Management Defines the Future of Electronics
04/15/2026 | Brian Buyea -- Column: Powering the FutureEvery leap forward in electronics comes with a familiar consequence: heat. Whether it’s a power module driving an electric vehicle, a laser diode used in surgery, or a 5G amplifier operating in orbit, higher performance inevitably means higher temperatures. While engineers celebrate breakthroughs in speed, density, and power, none of those specifications matter if the system can’t keep cool long enough to perform reliably.