Intelligent choice is not the hard option
26 February 2009
In terms of design innovation in a market demanding fast time-tomarket, hardware has had its day! Marcelle Douglas argues that focus should shift to development of the core ‘soft’ elements
With so many pressures on electronics design today, what can electronic designers do to remain innovative? The traditional approach of putting development of the hardware platform first with soft aspects built in and locked down isn’t practical anymore, creating a false sense of security in time-to-market as an important product differentiator. Whereas value that does differentiate a product (i.e., device intelligence or ‘IP’) is effectively tied to a rigid hardware platform - both being the most difficult and costliest design elements to change.
Instead, why not put the soft elements first and at the centre of the development process? This seemingly simplistic paradigm shift creates a dramatic change of focus. By separating function from the fixed physical
hardware, key elements of design are moved into the soft domain. No longer locked into the hard domain, they can be abstracted to a higher level where the designer can suddenly approach a design task from the
customer’s point of view rather than having to make a decision about hardware configuration before it’s even been decided what the product will do.
A soft IP focus opens the door for other additional advantages such as bringing unification to the overall
design process, allowing the benefit of technologies such as large-scale programmable chips, and moving beyond the current looselyintegrated point tools and a paradigm of fixed and outdated options.
Soft design expands to include hardware
FPGAs as embedded platforms with soft processors are gaining momentum as the basis of more versatile and reconfigurable hardware platforms. Becoming more popular as their capabilities rise, they’re also easier on the budget. Expanding soft design of these platforms is including an increasing amount of what were once the hardware aspects. Intellectual property programmed into the soft design system is fast becoming the most valuable part of the design, giving rise to architectural flexibility, and smaller, more adaptable boards.
Device IP that can be programmed into the system, rather than manufactured on the board, will offer the
most advantages in this brave new world. Soft design can start before the hardware platform is designed. It can continue after the hardware is designed, and even after it reaches customers. From a long-term
perspective, field ‘upgrades’ become possible, opening up a way for the customer to connect not only to the vendor themselves but also much bigger, electronic, ecosystems.
Complexities that once created the inherently difficult part of the traditional design approach (i.e., board design) are downgraded appropriately to something more manageable and focus is once again back on product differentiation and innovation instead of just ‘survival drivers’!
Interestingly enough, the implications for a soft design centric approach of all electronic systems extends beyond even the software. Designers can compare performance benefits and trade-offs of different FPGAs
without changing their design and without the commitment. Follow this thinking a bit further and we see that not only can the software be upgraded but also the hardware.
Device intelligence with or without hardware design
Perhaps the biggest driver for change is the familiar connectivity of ‘everything to everything’, which is so dramatically changing the role of technology in our lives. For example, you wouldn’t need to look any further than a humble digital picture frame as an example to illustrate the need for creating device intelligence independent of the hardware. Lots of people have them and lots of companies supply them. Many digital
picture frames can read their photos from memory cards or USB keys, but by adding additional connectivity and advanced graphics using a powerful unified design environment to upgrade the hardware’s platform, a company could offer something more and extend the basic capability of the single physical hardware platform to include wireless digital streaming of photos and other content from hard drives or the internet. Since the streaming occurs through the same functional interfaces, there is no need to change the hardware. In fact, it’s better if it doesn’t.
A similar example on a larger scale would be a broadband broadcasting company that wishes to provide more targeted advertisements to particular audiences and provide upgraded video quality as a part of
improved services to their customers – differentiating themselves from competitors providing the same broadcasting communications. Of course the immediate result is improved customer satisfaction, but
the natural progression is that this solution provides the basis of connecting the customer to a larger ecosystem and opening increased potential for creating a long-term relationship.
You may get a sense that one common theme weaving through all of this is that as device IP becomes more differentiated, hardware becomes less so. It’s not hard then to imagine customised hardware soon
becoming a remnant of past technology as more emphasis goes into sustainable design processes based on device intelligence that can deliver better results. A single hardware platform could effectively have multiple applications offering long-term design savings, inventory consolidation and the streamlining of production processes not possible with software alone.
Another repeating theme is that whole device development can happen in the soft domain. Device subsystems can be developed with or without the hardware dependency, separating function from the fixed physical hardware and deployed when needed. Rapid prototyping to develop a sense of how you would actually approach a design and the costs of production would be possible in the same amount of time that you would normally spend chasing up datasheets. Product lines can be more easily updated and extended, and existing projects can be reused, meaning fewer development hours. Hardware need only be built once and upgraded later.
Aesthetics and ease of use aren’t to be overlooked either. Customers are demanding that products look cool and be desirable in addition to being functional. Interfaces need to be attractive and easy to use. Products need to connect automatically to related equipment and peers as connected ecosystems become the new norm for the future. Products need to be intuitive enough that capabilities can be explored without reading the manual, and to be easily updated soon after deployment.
An implied requirement of being able to deliver these kinds of systems is the ability to use state-of-the-art design tools that unify the embedded development process. More importantly, it means identifying a solution
provider that has a strong commitment to innovation and continuous development.
The unified design environment has sustainable merit
When device intelligence comes first in the design process, it’s possible to move away from old paradigms and towards device connectivity. Obviously some larger organisations, such as those that use medical imaging, have been successfully using electronic ecosystems for a while. The idea isn’t new, it’s just been limited. But the clear suggestion is to bring this capability into the hands of every designer, and not just a select few. Why? Because device intelligence and connectivity enables electronics designers and their organisations to create systems that provide longer-term relationships with customers in ways that go beyond improved services or expected upgrades. They only require the right design environment.
Can a single tool provide a single approach to all phases of electronic design? Exploring choices invariably leads to a design environment that also has a reconfigurable hardware platform built in for that crucial
implementing, debugging and updating phase of development with freedom to experiment with various vendor devices and swap I/O hardware in and out. All the necessary tools for every aspect of electronic design would be included – processor-independent embedded coding and debugging, mixed schematic and HDL-based FPGA design and synthesis, as well as full PCB layout. Software engineers with only a basic understanding of hardware could use it. Hardware engineers could focus on designing and prototyping unique elements of design easily because not only would the software be upgradeable, but the hardware as well.
Requiring only minimal effort then to move the final design to production, off-the-shelf, reconfigurable hardware platforms can become the deployment mechanism bringing products to market quickly and without the need for full, custom board designs. Take this one step further and embedded engineers can create designs in hardware and dynamically deploy their efforts to physical hardware without even having to go to manufacture.
No more sacrificing design innovation to meet development deadlines means focus once again goes back into building the best customer experience possible – providing real long-term sustainability for organisations building electronic products, and perhaps even a little more fun for designers in the process.
MARCELLE DOUGLAS is Technical Editor for Altium
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