Electronica: AI-assistance supports new engineer experiences

Siemens adds AI capabilities to unite “the design experience” across its tools portfolio.

In an attempt to accelerate digital design, while dealing with constraints and resilience, Siemens has brought together its established software, Xpedition (pictured), Hyperlynx and PADS Professional, into a unified platform. The company has added cloud connectivity and collaboration, enhanced integration with its Teamcenter and NX software and added AI capability.

“There is a different way of designing electronics today,” said AJ Incorvaia, senior vice president of electronic board system for Siemens Digital Industries Software. “There is a need to make sure engineers have the expertise they need to meet changes in the marketplace, to bring on new engineers and foster clients to deal with constraints and resilience and accelerate the digital transformation. For this, a new design set is needed.”

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The integrated and multi-disciplinary approach brings the three software suites into a unified user experience with cloud connectivity and AI capabilities, he added.

The addition of AI creates intuitive tools designed to overcome the skills shortage in design today; engineers can quickly adapt with minimal learning curves, said the company. The toolset adds predictive engineering and support assistance using AI to streamline and optimise workflows. Cloud connectivity allows collaboration across groups and provides access to specialised services and resources in order to adapt to changing requirements or supply chain insights as well as collaborate with colleagues/partners, regardless of location.

The AI capability can be customised to an engineer’s personal preferences in much the same way as Microsoft preferences or command predictions can be defined. It provides process prediction, an in-tool support assistant, allows for natural language datasheet enquiries, searching of the support centre and optimised simulation to accelerate design optimisation and leverage the knowledge of experienced engineers, explained Incorvaia.

The unified software also has enhanced integration with Siemens’ Teamcenter software for product lifecycle management and NX software for product engineering, allowing for multi-BoM support and tighter collaboration between ECAD and MCAD domains.

Rigid data access restrictions can be configured and geo-located, while adhering to the strictest industry protocols, said the company. There are also design and verification requirements management for model-based systems engineering support.

The unified platform will be available in Q2 2025.