Electronic design automation firm Cadence Design Systems Inc said Monday that it has formed a new consulting unit that will give it a wider reach among industrial and consumer electronics companies. The creation of the Electronics Infusion group is aimed at assisting companies beyond its traditional high-tech sector market (semiconductors, computers and telecommunications) in the development of technologically-advanced products and services.
The first customer win for the new group comes in the form an alliance with $8.3bn industrial giant Ingersoll-Rand Co, which will see the company spend up to $100m over five years for Cadence’s design technology and related services. The new unit will be headed by senior vice president Bob Leach, who was the prime mover behind Cadence’s original services organization, which was formed five years ago. Leach is also credited with being the architect of the electronics industry’s first chip design outsourcing agreement, a five-year, $75m deal with Unisys in 1995.
Cadence said it expects the new group to expand its potential market to companies in a wide range of industries that don’t have the expertise or the desire to ramp up the large engineering organizations necessary to design state-of-the-art electronics devices.
