Power Integrations and SnapMagic Collaborate to Advance Power Supply Design Automation

Go from power supply specification to PCB layout in minutes with PI Expert and SnapMagic

SAN JOSE and SAN FRANCISCO, Calif., Oct. 5, 2023 – Power Integrations, a leader in high-voltage integrated circuits (ICs) for energy-efficient power conversion, and SnapMagic, a company dedicated to redefining the way electronic products are designed by simplifying the design process, today announced that Power Integrations’ powerful online design tool PI Expert™ now has schematic and netlist export capabilities, thanks to SnapMagic’s new schematic export technology.

Based on the user-entered specifications, PI Expert can automatically generate a complete power schematic using Power Integrations' power conversion ICs, including customized magnetic component design. Prior to this, the automated tool flow covered all aspects of the entire circuit optimization, but it needed to be manually transcribed into a CAD package for simulation and physical layout. The new export function ensures that the design (including symbols, PCB packages, 3D models, and electrical network tables) can be quickly and seamlessly transferred to one of four popular PCB CAD tools. Currently supports Cadence OrCAD, Altium, Autodesk Eagle/Fusion360 and KiCad.

“No need to manually create or download component symbols, these files can be ported into PCB layout tools once schematics are complete,” said Trevor Hiatt, director of channel marketing at Power Integrations . “This saves time, reduces transcription errors and, more importantly, aids in revision control and traceability. Schematics are formatted consistently and optimized for readability in the industry-standard 0.1-inch format.”

Natasha Baker, CEO and founder of SnapMagic , added: “Power Integrations has developed an incredible power supply design tool. By combining it with SnapMagic’s CAD expertise, we can export schematics in real time, streamlining the development process and allowing engineers to do what they do best – innovate. Not only have we saved engineers weeks of time, we’ve completely changed the game.”

Wayne Stambaugh, KiCad Project Leader, affirmed, “I believe that our design community will benefit greatly from being able to accelerate product development while ensuring design success. We are excited to see products built on PI Expert and SnapMagic provide native schematic export capabilities to our KiCad users.”

PI Expert Online is a web-based design program that automatically generates power conversion solutions based on the designer's power supply specifications and provides everything needed to build and test a working prototype. It includes a ready-made transformer construction report, winding instructions, electrical and mechanical drawings, BOM (Bill of Materials), and board layout recommendations. The entire process does not require software downloads or installations. The PI Expert schematic export function is compatible with user-defined custom components, and the exported schematic file contains a readme text file that provides step-by-step instructions for opening in the desired CAD tool. For more details, please watch this video.

SnapMagic's schematic export function created in PI Expert can help engineers speed up the process of designing with selected components and avoid manual errors. To start the export, engineers only need to select "File" > "Export Schematic" and then select the desired PCB format. SnapMagic's schematic converter will then provide a complete schematic, including schematic symbols and PCB footprints, and the whole operation is done in one go. In addition to schematic export, CAD models of specific Power Integrations components can also be downloaded from the main SnapMagic Search website (formerly known as SnapEDA).