- XJTAG to be implemented at UK manufacturing facilities at King’s Lynn and Cambridge with plans for a roll-out to its other operating sites soon
- XJTAG investment will enable Hansatech to reduce non-recurring engineering (NRE) expenses by up to £10k compared with traditional in circuit techniques for applicable printed circuit board types
- XJTAG selected ahead of competition due to its price, versatility, reusability of scripts and ease of integration with other test equipment
CAMBRIDGE, England, August 1, 2005 – Hansatech Limited (www.hansatech.co.uk), a leading UK-based contract electronics manufacturer, has selected XJTAG Limited as its global boundary scan test solution partner.
The XJTAG boundary scan system will be implemented initially at UK manufacturing facilities at King’s Lynn and Cambridge, and subsequently at its Poole facility and at its partner’s production site. The XJTAG system integrates seamlessly with Hansatech’s in-circuit and functional test fixtures.
According to Hansatech, for many board types, the XJTAG system will eradicate the need to build a dedicated in-circuit test (ICT) fixture and this will enable it to reduce non-recurring engineering (NRE) expenses by up to £10k per printed circuit board type. Hansatech manufactures a significant number of diverse products each month of which around half can utilise XJTAG, either exclusively or in conjunction with functional, ICT or flying probe testing. These boards are typically high complexity, densely populated circuits with at least one JTAG device.
Tim Murrell, senior electronics engineer for Hansatech Limited, who is based at the King’s Lynn facility, said: “XJTAG represents the biggest single step in test diagnostics that I have seen in years. It is an extremely versatile and flexible boundary scan solution, which, unlike some JTAG test products, integrates seamlessly with other test equipment. Not only will it help to reduce our test NRE expenses but it will enable us to significantly improve our diagnosis times and test coverage on densely packed circuit boards which are increasingly populated with flip chips, ball grid array and chip scale devices.”
Hansatech offers turnkey sub-contract assembly services to a wide range of customers in diverse industry sectors from mobile and satellite communications, medical and industrial instrumentation to specialist consumer products.
“We looked at other competitive boundary scan test products, and some were as much as twice the cost, but found that XJTAG with its versatility, reusability of scripts and a high level of diagnostics made it the most cost-effective solution,” added Murrell. “We are also finding that offering a sophisticated boundary scan solution such as XJTAG gives us a competitive advantage in the market. Our OEM (original equipment manufacturer) customers are becoming more JTAG-aware and have been impressed that XJTAG can be utilised at the design and prototyping stage and right through into production, field support and repair several customers already have their own XJTAG licence.”
The powerful and easy-to-use XJTAG Development System is designed to cut the cost and shorten the development cycle of electronic products and provides a unique solution that can test JTAG as well as non-JTAG devices. XJTAG can test a high proportion of a circuit including BGA and chip scale devices, SDRAMs, Ethernet controllers, video interfaces, flash memories, FPGAs (Field Programmable Gate Arrays), microprocessors and many other devices. XJTAG also enables In-System Programming of FPGAs, CPLDs (Complex Programmable Logic Devices) and flash memories.
The XJTAG Development System can migrate seamlessly through the product life cycle from early design to field support and repair. XJTAG enables circuit designers to shorten the development cycle and prototyping process by facilitating early test development, early design validation of CAD netlists, fast generation of complex functional tests and test re-use across circuits that utilise the same devices. XJTAG test scripts are also re-usable and portable across different boards due to the novel device-centric approach that the designers have adopted.
For more information about the XJTAG Development System, please contact XJTAG, St John’s Innovation Centre, Cowley Road, Cambridge, CB4 0DS, UK. Telephone +44 (0) 1223 223007, fax +44 (0) 1223 223009 or email enquiries@xjtag.com. Alternatively, visit www.xjtag.com.
About Hansatech (www.hansatech.co.uk)
The Hansatech Group UK comprises four plants offering turnkey sub-contract assembly services to a wide range of customers in diverse industry sectors from mobile and satellite communications, medical and industrial instrumentation to specialist consumer products. With locations in King’s Lynn, Poole and Cambridge totalling some 101,000 sq ft (10,000 sq m), the Group’s plants offer a highly flexible approach to the sub-contract assembly and support of electronics based products of many types and styles. Hansatech also provides a flexible soft start to low cost off-shore far eastern manufacturing by providing full new product introduction (NPI) manufacturing services in the UK before transferring production to IMI Inc in the Philippines as part of a strategic alliance between the two companies.
About XJTAG (www.xjtag.com)
XJTAG Limited is a specialist design and test tool developer. Its JTAG (Joint Test Action Group) development system offers a competitive solution for designers and developers of electronic circuits. Utilising XJTAG allows circuit development and prototyping process to be shortened significantly by facilitating early test development, early design validation, fast development of functional tests and test re-use across circuits that utilise the same devices. The company is based in the U.K. at St John’s Innovation Centre, Cowley Road, Cambridge. XJTAG is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Cambridge Technology Group (www.cambridgetechgroup.com).
What is JTAG?
Advances in silicon design, such as increasing device density and, more recently, ball grid array (BGA) and chip scale packaging, have reduced the efficacy of traditional electronic circuit testing methods. In order to overcome these problems and others, some of the world’s leading silicon manufacturers combined to form the Joint Test Action Group (JTAG). The findings of this group were used as the basis for the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) standard 1149.1: Standard Test Access Port and Boundary Scan Architecture and subsequently the standard became known as JTAG.
