Major update for flagship PCB design tool announced

Altium has announced the next major update to its flagship PCB design tool, Altium Designer, at PCB West, an annual PCB design conference in Santa Clara, California. Attendees at PCB West 2015 will get an exclusive first look at all of the new features coming to Altium Designer 16 before its scheduled release in the fall. This update will allow engineers to get their designs done even faster and error-free with the addition of new automation and productivity tools, says the company.

"The increasing complexity of today's electronic designs requires the most productive design environment for engineers to remain competitive," said Christopher Donato, VP Americas, Altium. "Our focus for this release is to provide PCB designers with the most productive and efficient PCB design platform available to meet the demands of every engineering challenge."

New features include :

1. A new alternative part choice system allows designers to fully control their component selection process with backup part choices for manufacturing.
2. Visual clearance boundaries allow designers to understand the impact of their routing decisions in real-time with visual clearance boundaries between objects on a board.
3. A new component placement system allows designers to create the most organized and efficient board layouts with new component placement options.

"The new features we've developed in Altium Designer 16 reflect our commitment to the on-going value and growth of the Altium Designer platform," said Sergey Kostinsky, VP of engineering, Altium. "This release furthers our goal of creating the best design tool for mainstream PCB designers who need to meet increasingly tight deadlines and budget."