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What is Electronic Design Services?Electronic design services are services provided by electronic design companies or ODMs (original design manufacturers) to assist clients in the design and development of electronic products.
Electronics have become an integral part of our daily lives; from smartphones to wearables, smart homes, new energy electronics, telecommunications, medical devices, automotive electronics, industrial automation, and more, electronics power the technology around us.
However, developing electronic products requires electrical, mechanical, and software engineering expertise. This is where electronic design services come into play. Electronic design services refers to the design, development, testing, debugging, and approval of electronic products. It involves end-to-end development, from the concept stage to bringing products to market. Electronic product development companies provide services that cover the product life cycle to help build innovative connected devices faster and more cost-effectively.
Electronic Design Services Process
The electronic design services process consists of a series of stages that are essential to transition from conceptualization or ideation to the final production stage. The process of designing, innovating, creating, and manufacturing electronic products is called electronic design development. For most electronic design companies, the electronic design services manufacturing and assembly process typically includes the following key steps:
1. Requirements Analysis
This initial stage focuses on collecting and analyzing customer requirements to develop product specification documents. Capture functional and non-functional requirements. Conduct market research to assess feasibility and analyze the competitive landscape. This is a key point in electronic product design.
2. Concept Development – Concept development ensures that the electronic product meets the customer's requirements. It is able to stand out from the market competition and is technically feasible. The first phase focuses on understanding the customer's requirements and defining the product specifications. The output is a product requirement document that helps further development.
3. System Architecture Design – This phase involves the overall system architecture, including hardware and software parts. Key activities include:
Developing schematics Circuit diagrams Defining APIs/interfaces between subsystems Developing firmware architecture Mechanical structure modeling
4. Budget Estimation – This phase calculates the expenses and budgets associated with the production and manufacturing process. Early budget estimates ensure that the product to be designed can be produced within the budget and profitably. Budget estimation is also very important in electronic product design.
5. Hardware and Software Design – In this phase, the modules defined in the system architecture are designed in detail. For hardware, this includes PCB layout design, part selection, simulation, etc. Detailed software design involves coding modules, unit testing, integration testing, etc.
6. Verification and Validation - Electronic design verifies and confirms that the designed electronic system or device meets the specified requirements and operates as expected. The designed prototypes are rigorously tested to verify compliance with specifications and identify defects. HALT, EMI/EMC and environmental tests are conducted to verify robustness. Validation is the process of ensuring that the final electronic product development meets customer needs, expectations and wants. It includes the following steps:
Field testing Test system Reliability and performance testing Legal compliance
7. Electronic manufacturing This is an important stage of electronic design services. It involves putting the product into production by selecting assembly partners from component suppliers and working closely to increase production speed.
8. Certification and Documentation - Based on global market conditions, electronic products that are put on the market need to be certified by standards. Electronic products must meet various regulatory requirements related to safety and emissions, such as UL, CE, FCC, etc., depending on the target market. Certification activities are carried out simultaneously throughout the design cycle.
Finally, the electronic designer will format detailed documents that describe the product design, functionality, and manufacturing process.
9. Production Sustainment
After release, support such as failure analysis, upgrades, optimization, etc. is provided as needed during the production lifecycle. Now, this is a complete electronic design and manufacturing process.
electronic design services
Key Activities of Electronic Product Development:
The electronic design service process usually includes design, development and production. The electronic design process usually covers multiple activities such as concept design, implementation, test/validation, manufacturing support, etc.
Collect and analyze product requirements Develop system architecture model Create schematics and circuit design Perform circuit modeling and simulation
Design PCB layout Select electrical components Develop firmware and embedded software Mechanical design of enclosure, PCB, etc.
Prototype manufacturing and iterative design improvements Create test plans and test cases Validate tests - functional, environmental, EMI/EMC, etc. Design for Manufacturing (DFM) analysis Support production test setup design Provide continuous engineering support after release
In the field of advanced technology, electronic design services (EDS) play a vital role in our daily lives. With the increase in complexity and the demand for faster time to market, many companies outsource electronic product design and development to experienced and professional suppliers.
electronic design services
Outsourcing electronic product development projects to electronic design services companies has some of the following benefits:
Access to cross-domain expertise:
Electronic design services requires expertise in electrical, mechanical, software engineering and other fields. Outsourcing vendors have large multidisciplinary teams to deliver high-quality designs faster.
Focus on core competencies:
The electronics industry may not be a company's core competency. Outsourcing design projects allows them to focus on their strengths and business priorities.
Saving costs and time:
Retaining an in-house team for occasional design projects can be expensive. Outsourcing vendors save costs through hardware labs, flexible resources and expertise to avoid costly design mistakes.
Accelerating product development:
Experienced design partners use agile methodologies for early prototyping and design iterations to reduce time to market. Their understanding of manufacturing design also ensures faster production ramp-up.
Single point of accountability:
Capabilities and single point of accountability. This avoids multi-vendor coordination issues.
So if you want to get electronic design services, feel free to ask us!