Computer-aided design for quality (CADQ)

This paper describes computer-aided design for quality — a new, cost-effective methodology for designing high-quality, manufacturable products using computer-aided design (CAD) systems. Traditionally, CAD systems have been used to simulate a producT's characteristics for a given set of values for the design parameters. Thus, designers could study the effects of design choices on a producT's quality before production started. Recent advances in computer hardware technology have given CAD systems increasingly complex and accurate simulation capabilities, permitting simultaneous examination of the effects of changes in many design parameters. But CADQ goes a step further. It provides powerful, statistical, model-fitting methods and optimization techniques that extend the traditional use of CAD systems. Given a set of quality-performance measures, a designer now can interactively pursue a producT's optimal design, while considering manufacturing constraints and characteristics of the customers' environment. Through a case study, we show the application of CADQ to integrated-circuit design.