There are various tools that meet the demands of designers and allow them to achieve their board in a short time. Circuit design at all levels requires a wide range of various disciplines. There are software for designing PCB schematic, PCB layout, and more. But it is at least a first step.PCB fabrication requires the use of several software, tools, and procedures. And yes the current simulation support of kicad is not quite there to fulfill these requirements. Meaning proper simulation support (potentially even with extracted board characteristics) can reduce time to market and of course the general development costs.

Part of that can be done with simulation which can potentially reduce the number of prototype boards needed (as some iterations can be done with simulation).

The users there need to proof to either their boss or even their customer that there is a low enough risk for failure to make the Investment of a production run worth it. However simulation is definitely a requirement for Commercial users. Both of these don’t have a market share to say this missing feature would be an issue for the majority of users. The only places where i can imagine them being of use today is in high frequency designs or flexible boards. Kicad dev should focus on most used PCB designing tool feature like tear drop etc, not on less used feature like spice simulationĪre you sure tear drops are one of the most used features? It has been ages since i have seen a PCB with teardrops as the issue they solve is not really there anymore in modern production (where alignment tolerances between copper and drills is rather tight).

Altium circuitmaker