Component placement strategy in PCB Design - Real Business Scenario

Scenario Mode

👤 Your Role: You are a PCB design engineer working on a new electronic product.

📋 Request: Your manager wants a report showing the best component placement strategy to optimize board space and signal integrity.

📊 Data: You have a dataset listing components with their types, sizes, signal types, and connectivity requirements.

🎯 Deliverable: Create a dashboard that visualizes component placement zones, grouped by signal type and size, and a calculated measure showing average distance between connected components.

Sample Data

ComponentID	Type	Size_mm2	SignalType	ConnectedTo
R1	Resistor	2	Analog	C1
C1	Capacitor	3	Analog	R1
U1	IC	25	Digital	U2
U2	IC	30	Digital	U1
L1	Inductor	5	Power	U1
J1	Connector	15	Power	U2
D1	Diode	4	Analog	R1
Q1	Transistor	6	Digital	U2

1

Step 1: Group components by SignalType and calculate total Size_mm2 per group.

Create a pivot table: Rows=SignalType, Values=SUM(Size_mm2)

Expected Result

Analog: 9 mm2, Digital: 61 mm2, Power: 20 mm2

2

Step 2: Create a scatter plot showing components with Size_mm2 on X-axis and SignalType as color categories.

Scatter plot config: X=Size_mm2, Color=SignalType, Tooltip=ComponentID

Expected Result

Visual clusters by signal type with component sizes visible

3

Step 3: Calculate average distance between connected components assuming coordinates (X,Y) are assigned later.

Add measure: AverageDistance = AVERAGE(Distance between ConnectedTo pairs)

Expected Result

AverageDistance measure placeholder for future coordinate data

4

Step 4: Create a dashboard combining the pivot table and scatter plot to visualize placement zones and sizes.

Dashboard layout: Top-left pivot table, bottom scatter plot, right side measure card for AverageDistance

Expected Result

Dashboard showing component size distribution by signal type and placement strategy insights

Final Result

Analog

↓

Digital

↓

Power

Bonus Challenge

Add coordinate data for each component and calculate the exact average distance between connected components.

Show Hint

Assign X,Y coordinates to each component and use Euclidean distance formula to compute distances.