What’s New in Xpedition – Layout

In the last What’s New in Xpedition blog post, we reviewed the new FPGA-PCB Co-design features that are available in the Xpedition VX.2 series of releases. We looked at the enhanced FPGA wizard, along with the functionality for multi-gigabit transceiver signal group optimization, enhanced back annotation to maintain schematic integrity, and a new option to place FPGA symbols during schematic capture. In this blog post, we’ll take a look under the hood and check out what’s new in the area of Layout. Xpedition Layout provides an environment for collaborative planning, placement, and routing of highly complex printed circuit boards. By combining ease-of-use with designer-assisted advanced functionality, it offers designers and engineers industry-leading technology to address today’s design challenges. The layout environment includes automated placement planning and management, auto-assisted routing, customizable multi-pass autorouting, and more.

With the VX.2 series of releases, Layout has increased support for flex and rigid-flex designs. Layout’s correct-by-construction environment simplifies the design process, from creation of complex rigid-flex stack-ups, to definition of bend areas with associated constraints, to accurate output for manufacturing. Recent updates and enhancements include:

• Support for multiple board outlines, each potentially utilizing a unique independent stackup
• Support for flex-specific layers including the flex core base substrate, cover layer, adhesive and stiffener
• Rigid-flex aware functionality that includes bend and fold control and an understanding of flex-specific requirements for padstacks, vias, traces, plane fills, component placement and DRC
• A check to flag invalid stackups for flex and rigid-flex designs

The VX.2 series also delivers innovative layout functionality that provides for:

• Enhanced functionality to align a 3D model with a 2D footprint
• The ability to associate hyperlinks with most design objects
• Support for concurrent sketch planning during team design sessions
• The ability to review Valor NPI DRC’s from within the hazard explorer

If you would like a preview of what’s new, please feel free to check out the What’s New in Xpedition video, along with online demos of the highlights for each of the VX.2 releases. You can also take a quick tour of Xpedition Enterprise to get a great overview of all the functionality that Xpedition has to offer.

Be sure to check back for the next entry in this series – What’s New in Xpedition – Design Verification.