STI Electronics Engineering
Our Expert Circuit Design Services
STI Research and Development: Leading Innovations in Electronics Assembly
STI’s robust involvement in research and development for component packaging technologies and electronics assembly manufacturing ensures the continuous improvement and adaptation of cutting-edge techniques and tools. Below are the highlights of STI's capabilities and offerings:
- Industry Leadership: Through strategic R&D programs, STI has secured top-tier talent and the latest equipment in electronics manufacturing and circuit design.
- ITAR Registration and US-Based Operations: STI is ITAR registered and operates in the United States, equipped with engineers skilled in designing, developing, and assembling ruggedized electronic assemblies that meet specific customer specifications.
- Expertise Across Sectors: With a strong background in Defense, Aerospace, Space, and commercial sectors, STI excels in circuit design and product assembly tailored to diverse application requirements.
STI's Technical Capabilities in Electronics Design and Integration
STI demonstrates a comprehensive range of capabilities that underline its leadership in electronic design and assembly:
- Schematic Forward Circuit Design: Focuses on the initial phase of circuit design, ensuring that all electronic and electrical components are accurately represented and integrated.
- PCB Layout & Circuit Design: Specializes in designing the physical layout of printed circuit boards while ensuring optimal circuit performance and reliability.
- System Level Integration: Integrates various electronic components and systems into a complete, functioning unit, addressing compatibility and performance.
- Size, Weight & Power Reduction: Aims to minimize the size, weight, and power consumption of electronic systems, crucial for applications where efficiency and portability are key.
- Design for Manufacturing (DFM): Emphasizes the design process that facilitates efficient manufacturing operations, reducing costs and enhancing product quality.
- Material Optimization: Selects and utilizes materials that provide the best balance between cost, performance, and durability in product design and manufacturing.
These capabilities reflect STI’s commitment to delivering high-quality, precisely engineered solutions that meet the complex and evolving needs of its customers.
STI Electronics Engineering
Schematic Forward Design
STI's proven expertise in schematic forward design offers customers superior quality design services tailored to complex and high-reliability projects. As an integral extension of customer engineering teams, STI excels in managing the intricacies of advanced technologies, ensuring all designs meet specific customer specifications efficiently and cost-effectively.
Key Features of STI’s Schematic Forward Design Services:
- Analog and Digital Designs: Expertise in designing circuits that accommodate both analog and digital components, ensuring functional and reliable integration.
- High Frequency RF Layouts: Specialization in radio frequency layouts, optimized for high frequency applications.
- Controlled Impedance Designs: Focus on designing circuits with precise impedance control, essential for signal integrity in high-speed applications.
- Design Attributes and Rules Management: Implementation of detailed design attributes and strict management of design rules to ensure compliance and performance.
- Design Library Generation: Creation of extensive libraries including part, package, and electrical symbols, which streamline the design process and enhance consistency.
- Full Forward/Back Annotation: Ensures that changes in the design flow are reflected across all stages, maintaining accuracy and integrity throughout the development process.
STI's commitment to delivering exceptional schematic forward design services is evident in its meticulous attention to detail, adherence to industry standards, and collaborative approach with clients. This dedication ensures that projects not only meet but exceed the high reliability and functionality required in today’s demanding technology landscapes.
STI Electronics Engineering
PCB Layout & Design
STI’s PCB layout and design services bring together a multi-disciplinary team of electrical, mechanical, thermal, manufacturing, and test engineers. This collaboration ensures that the PCBs not only meet but excel in assembly, testing, and field performance, significantly reducing product development costs by addressing key design factors right from the start.
Key Elements of STI’s PCB Layout & Design Services:
- RF Design: Specialization in designing PCBs for radio frequency applications, ensuring optimal performance in communication and signal processing.
- Tuned Routing: Implementation of routing techniques that match the required signal frequencies to enhance circuit efficiency and performance.
- Shielding: Techniques to minimize electromagnetic interference, crucial for maintaining signal integrity in complex layouts.
- High Speed Routing: Designing signal paths for high-speed operations to prevent delays and distortion in fast-operating environments.
- Bypass/Filter Component Placement: Strategic placement of filtering and bypass components to stabilize power supply and signal integrity.
- Controlled Impedance Routing: Precise control of trace impedance to match the system's impedance requirements, essential for high-speed data transmission.
- Matched Length Rules: Ensures that critical signal paths are of equal length to prevent timing discrepancies in digital circuits.
- Differential Pair Routing: Techniques for routing paired signals that reduce susceptibility to electromagnetic interference and crosstalk.
- Forward/Backward Annotation: Maintaining consistency and accuracy throughout the design process by ensuring that changes are reflected at all stages.
- Library Creation and Maintenance: Development and upkeep of comprehensive component libraries that support efficient and accurate design iterations.
- Land Pattern Optimization: Optimization of pad shapes and sizes to improve solderability and connection reliability during assembly.
Through these sophisticated PCB layout and design practices, STI effectively addresses the critical design factors that impact manufacturing and assembly, product performance, and long-term reliability. This approach ensures that PCB designs are not only feasible but optimized for all phases of the product lifecycle.
STI Electronics Engineering
System Level Integration
STI offers comprehensive system level integration services designed to streamline the entire documentation process for board-level and system-level assemblies. This involves creating detailed assembly documentation that captures all necessary materials, processes, and final requirements to ensure efficient and accurate assembly and integration.
Key Components of STI’s System Level Integration Services:
- Wiring Diagram: Provides a detailed representation of electrical connections and circuitry within the system.
- Box Build Documentation: Outlines the processes and components involved in the construction of the complete enclosure and associated electronic assemblies.
- Full Assembly Drawings: Detailed illustrations that show all components and their arrangement within the assembly.
- Workmanship Standards Referencing: Ensures all assembly processes meet specific quality and precision standards.
- Mechanical Detail: Includes comprehensive details of the mechanical components and their configurations.
- Dimensioning: Accurate measurements of all components and assemblies to ensure compatibility and fit.
- Tolerance Stack Up Analysis: Evaluation of the cumulative effect of part tolerances in the complete assembly to ensure proper fit and function.
- Material Compatibility Review: Assesses the interaction between different materials to prevent issues such as corrosion or thermal mismatch.
- Thermal Interface Material Selection: Chooses materials that optimize thermal conduction between components, crucial for maintaining operational temperature ranges.
STI’s system level integration services are crucial for ensuring that all aspects of the assembly are documented, understood, and properly implemented. This meticulous approach helps in identifying the best assembly materials and processes while ensuring that all components meet the final inspection requirements and adhere to upper-level assembly specifications.
STI Electronics Engineering
Size, Weight & Power Reduction
STI is at the forefront of advancing military and aerospace electronics by employing innovative design and packaging techniques to meet the stringent SWaP (Size, Weight, and Power) reduction requirements. This focus is essential as the challenge in current designs stems from packaging limitations rather than circuit design capabilities.
Key Aspects of STI’s SWaP Reduction Strategy:
- Reduced Form Factor: Achieving compact designs to fit advanced electronics into smaller spaces without compromising functionality.
- Miniaturized Components: Utilizing smaller components to reduce overall size and weight while maintaining or enhancing performance.
- Increased Performance: Enhancing the functionality and efficiency of electronics within the existing or reduced power budgets.
- Ruggedized Applications: Ensuring durability and reliability under harsh conditions, critical for military and aerospace applications.
- Reduced Interconnects: Minimizing the number of interconnections to simplify design and increase reliability.
- Space Constraints: Addressing the limitations imposed by tight spatial requirements in device assembly and integration.
- Imbedded and/or Stacked Components: Using techniques like STI’s patented Imbedded Component/Die Technology (IC/DT®) to integrate components within a 3-D laminate substrate, which also includes integrated thermal management.
- Low-Weight Solutions: Focusing on reducing the weight of components and assemblies to meet stringent industry standards.
- Light Weight Interconnects: Implementing lighter interconnect solutions to further decrease the overall weight without sacrificing performance.
Through these efforts, STI’s engineers leverage both traditional and cutting-edge technologies, including the proprietary IC/DT® approach, to produce electronics that meet critical SWaP criteria. This is crucial for the development of high-density circuit card assemblies where conventional packaging technologies are insufficient. STI's approach not only meets but exceeds the rigorous demands for miniaturization, thermal management, and overall system performance required in today’s most challenging applications.
STI Electronics Engineering
Design for Manufacturing (DFM)
STI emphasizes defect prevention and efficiency in manufacturing by meticulously analyzing the design data package to identify and rectify common errors. This thorough approach to Design for Manufacturing (DFM) and Design for Test (DFT) is key in ensuring high-quality products that meet the demands of global competition, focusing on quality, cost reduction, and speed to market.
Key Components of STI’s DFM Strategy:
- BOM Analysis: Scrutinizing the Bill of Materials to ensure accuracy and optimal component selection.
- Component Review: Examining each component for performance and compatibility with the overall design.
- Availability/Alternate Selection: Identifying available components and selecting alternatives to avoid production delays.
- PWB Drawing Review: Assessing printed wiring board drawings for potential manufacturing issues.
- Test Point Access: Ensuring that test points are accessible to facilitate easy testing and quality control.
- Form/Fit Requirements: Checking that all components conform to the specified form and fit criteria.
- Fabrication Note Review: Reviewing notes related to fabrication to ensure clear and correct manufacturing instructions.
- Soldermask Clearance: Verifying adequate clearance on soldermasks to prevent solder bridging.
- Silkscreen Identifiers: Ensuring that silkscreen identifiers are accurate and clear for assembly guidance.
- PWA Manufacturing Analysis: Analyzing the printed wiring assembly for manufacturability issues.
- Fiducials for Automated Assembly: Including fiducial marks to aid in the accuracy of automated assembly processes.
- PWB Depanelization Requirements: Reviewing requirements for depanelization to ensure integrity and ease of board separation.
- Land Pattern Review: Examining land patterns for optimal solderability and component placement.
- Component Placement for SMT: Strategizing component placement for surface-mount technology to enhance assembly efficiency.
- Assembly Materials Selection: Choosing materials that optimize the manufacturing process while meeting product requirements.
- Manufacturing Process Parameters: Defining and optimizing manufacturing process parameters to maximize efficiency and yield.
By aligning the customer’s design with current manufacturing processes and materials, STI ensures that the final product is not only of high quality but also economically feasible to produce. This integration of DFM principles into the design stage leads to higher yields, fewer design iterations, and a streamlined path from fabrication to delivery.
STI Electronics Engineering
Material Optimization
Material optimization at STI plays a pivotal role in streamlining production and reducing costs. By effectively managing the bill of materials (BOM) from the design phase through to procurement, STI ensures both efficiency and reliability in the manufacturing process, while also addressing the challenges of market timing and component availability.
Key Elements of STI’s Material Optimization Services:
- BOM Scrubbing: Thorough review and cleaning of the BOM to ensure accuracy and completeness.
- Validate Manufacturer Part Numbers: Checking part numbers against manufacturer records to ensure accuracy and prevent procurement errors.
- Procurement Resource Planning: Strategically planning component procurement to align with production schedules and minimize delays.
- Component Obsolescence: Identifying and addressing components that are at risk of becoming obsolete, to avoid production interruptions.
- Identify Approved Alternates: Finding suitable alternative components that meet the design specifications without compromising quality or performance.
- Trusted Supplier Analysis: Evaluating suppliers to ensure they meet STI’s standards for reliability and quality.
- Validate Authorized Distributors: Confirming that components are sourced from authorized distributors to mitigate the risk of counterfeit parts.
STI’s material optimization process is designed to mitigate risks associated with component procurement and manufacturing. By ensuring the use of accurate, timely, and high-quality materials from trusted sources, STI enhances the overall efficiency and cost-effectiveness of the production cycle, ultimately ensuring that products meet the demanding schedules and quality expectations of their customers.
STI Electronics Engineering
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