Research Reveals Power Engineers Struggle with Changes in Requirements

The biggest power design challenges identified by engineers are subsequent changes to the specifications after the design process has begun. According to research conducted by Vicor Corporation, 87% of power system designers around the world identified specification changes as the most frequent impediment in designing power systems.

“When creating power system designs engineers need to consider new, more flexible approaches in anticipation of specification changes,” said Rob Russell, VP of Product Marketing Vicor. “The Power Component Design Methodology enables engineers to easily swap out different components in their power design with minimal risk toward schedule.”

The research also highlighted the challenge of meeting project timelines. 80% of power engineers are already struggling to meet time constraints when designing power systems and 79% feel that project schedules are tighter, due to time-to-market pressures. Specification changes directly negatively impact schedules according to 65% of engineers.

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Vicor’s in-depth research identifies today’s trials and challenges of designing power systems in an increasingly demanding business environment. Vicor has published the first in a series of whitepapers, “Spec Changes Top List of Power Designers’ Challenges”, which analyzes the causes and impacts of specification changes in more detail. While specifications changes may be inevitable, your approach to managing change can make them less problematic.

Vicor’s Power Component Design Methodology enables power system designers to reap all of the benefits of modular power component design – predictable component and system functionality and reliability, fast design cycles, and easy system configurability, re-configurability and scaling – while achieving system operating efficiency, power density and economy that rival the best alternative solutions.

Utilizing Vicor’s Power System Designer, engineers can select from an extensive portfolio of proven Vicor power components to architect, optimize and simulate their complete power system, all the way from their input sources to their points of load. This innovative approach to power system design delivers fast time-to-market and state-of-the-art performance while minimizing the possibility of last minute surprises and delays that so often occur with conventional or custom design methodologies.