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Mechanical engineers face tighter timelines, smaller product footprints, and rising pressure to align seamlessly with electrical teams.  In today’s design environment, disconnection between engineers can no longer go untreated. The demand on teams brings with it a need to simplify inter-departmental interactions, and communication is at the core of all developments.  Despite CAD adoption, design data still lives in isolated silos, making...

Many electronic medical devices incorporate mechanical form factors which restrict the size, space, and placement of components in the PCB. In the not-too-distant past, mechanical prototyping relied heavily on prototyped electrical and mechanical assemblies to ensure form and fit inside the device enclosure or in the intended deployment environment. However, today’s MCAD tools have helped to eliminate mechanical prototyping spins while enabling...

As robotics systems become increasingly compact, complex, and demand higher performance, the traditional boundaries between mechanical and electrical must be broken. Engineers face mounting pressure to ensure that every component, from printed circuit boards (PCBs) and connectors to enclosures and actuators, fits into more complex casing.  Design flaws related to fit, form and function can derail development, increase costs, and compromise...

As electronic products continue to become more compact and interconnected, the use of multiple PCBs within a single device has become standard practice. From modular medical equipment to industrial systems and consumer tech, multiboard architectures allow engineers to optimize layout, improve serviceability and manage complexity through functional partitioning. The System-Level Challenge: Designing with Multiple Boards But complexity is the...

Today’s consumer devices pack more electronics into smaller, more mechanically complex products than ever before. Mechanical engineers are under constant pressure to design slimmer, lighter, and more unique enclosures while keeping costs down. But even with well-developed skills in their own domain, one of the biggest challenges remains the outdated and disjointed workflow between mechanical (MCAD) and electrical (ECAD) design teams. A Web of...

As a mechanical engineer, you own the form, fit, function, and manufacturability of a product’s final assembly. But as products have become smarter and more connected, the PCB that powers them has transitioned from a simple component to be housed into a complex, 3D subsystem with its own mechanical constraints. Despite links between MCAD and ECAD software, engineering teams still rely on manual data sharing that compromise designs, resembling not...

The defining trend in modern electronics is a paradox: devices must shrink in size while expanding in power and functionality; this relentless push for miniaturization, from handhelds to wearables, has fundamentally reshaped the role of the mechanical engineer. The days of designing a simple ‘box’ to house a PCB are gone. Today, the enclosure is an active, elaborate system that must provide structural integrity, manage heat, and shield from...

The modern electronics landscape rewards teams that coordinate early and often. With tighter schedules, more complex systems and volatile supply chains, the cost of misalignment is too high to ignore. Success depends on context sharing, collaborative processes and fewer late-stage surprises. That level of collaboration can’t be achieved with static design reviews and a jumble of email threads. It must happen inside the tools where engineers and...

Wearables continue to get smaller and smarter, delivering seamless experiences that consumers are beginning to adopt like second nature. And while a skin patch, ring, or pair of sunglasses may appear simple, inside there’s a fully integrated PCB system that senses, computes, and communicates while withstanding motion, moisture, and everyday use. In this type of product, PCB layout determines whether a design will work as intended. The best of...