ElectronicSpecifier’s research highlights the issues facing analogue design engineers

Unsurprisingly, we found that analogue design remains important in most systems, although few engineers consider themselves to be analogue specialists.19% of the respondents said that analogue was “critical” to their designs and a further 54% said that it was “very important”. Just over a quarter of the engineers surveyed said that analogue was only needed for a small or specific part of their systems, and no one said that analogue was unimportant. So it’s clear that modern systems still have a large analogue component.

Despite this, only 14% said they specialise in analogue design: the vast majority of engineers do other design work in addition to analogue. This means that engineers need to keep a wide range of different skills up to date: something that is likely to be a challenge.



Although analogue is important in most engineer’s systems, there has been little change in the amount of analogue design work done by engineers. Whilst 18% said the amount of analogue design work had increased in the last three years, 19% said it had decreased and the vast majority (63%) said that the amount of analogue design they do has not changed.

Engineers face several challenges in analogue design, with the main problems being keeping their skills and knowledge of new products up to date. Layout was the biggest technical challenge, presenting a problem for 30% of engineers. But it seems that analogue semiconductor manufacturers are doing a good job, as less than 20% complained about lack of documentation, and only 9% felt that they were not getting the applications support that they needed.



Perhaps the most interesting findings from the research were the reasons for choosing a particular analogue semiconductor supplier. The devices themselves obviously matter: the most important factor was product quality, and performance was the third most important factor. But quality of documentation and support also have a significant impact on whose products get used.



Analogue designers are clearly independent: approved vendors or vendors that the engineer has used before are not significant factors, and they’re not worried about the idea of a “one-stop shop”, as choosing a vendor that supplies other products they use was the least important factor.

This research has shown that analogue design is still an important part of many electronic systems. With few specialist analogue designers, engineers are struggling to keep up to date. This means that whilst the product quality and performance are key factors in selecting a vendor, engineers are also concerned about documentation and support, presumably so that they can reduce risk and ensure their projects are completed on time. Clearly analogue semiconductor manufacturers need to focus on helping engineers use their products, as well as on developing great devices.