The Economics of Automatic Testing

Engineering is... “the art of doing that well with one dollar—that any bungler can do with two—after a fashion”. This famous definition by Arthur Wellington*, the father of engineering economics, says it all. This book takes that premise, shows how it applies to testing decisions in electronics, shows why full life-cycle costs need to be determined, shows how to make all of the calculations and shows how to present a case to senior management in terms they understand. The book content is the 1994 second printed edition—it remains up to date because the economic concepts and methods described in the book have not changed. There are a few additional notes which have been added for clarity. *Arthur Wellington, The Economic Theory of the Location of Railways - Pub 1887

Engineering is... “the art of doing that well with one dollar—that any bungler can do with two—after a fashion”. This famous definition by Arthur Wellington*, the father of engineering economics, says it all. This book takes that premise, shows how it applies to testing decisions in electronics, shows why full life-cycle costs need to be determined, shows how to make all of the calculations and then shows how to present a case to senior management in terms they understand. Originally published in 1994 the book remains up to date because it is not about defect rates, labour rates or test technology—the things that constantly change—it is about managing the potentially conflicting issues of cost, quality, time-to-market and technology adoption, by using engineering economics and life-cycle-cost analysis, so that optimal decisions can be made about incredibly complex technological issues in design, manufacturing, test and the field—none of which has changed. These core concepts and the calculation methods have changed in only one respect—it has become more important than ever to use them! Citation (April, 2011): Norman Pascoe. “Reliability Technology: Principles and Practice of Failure Prevention in Electronic Systems.” Based on course notes from an MIT class. Published April 2011 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. “An excellent account of the technology, economics and associated advantages of using ATE is provided by Brendan Davis. Although Davis wrote this comprehensive work on the economics of automatic testing over a quarter of a century ago, the value of its contents has not in any way diminished with time.” Note that Mr Pascoe’s reference to a “quarter of a century” shows that he is referring to the 1982 edition of the book rather than the much expanded and improved 1994 second edition! *Arthur Wellington, The Economic Theory of the Location of Railways - Pub 1887

Brendan Davis started his career in 1959 as an apprentice with the Automatic Telephone and Electric Company (AT&E)—a pioneer of automatic telephone exchanges and radio communication systems in the UK. By the end of his apprenticeship he was running the test equipment maintenance and calibration department. He became interested in test technology, and left in 1966 to join the UK office of the General Radio Company—universally known as GR and revered by every radio amateur on the planet at that time. Founded in 1915, in Cambridge Massachusetts, to supply test and measurement equipment to the emerging radio broadcasting and communications industries, GR became the main pioneer of test and measurement and arguably one of the most influential companies of all time. Through close links with MIT and other universities, plus their own brilliant designers, they made most of the basic test equipment tools commercially available for the first time. Prior to GR if you needed to measure something you had to build your own measurement tools. The list of GR ‘firsts’ is huge but a brief selection includes the oscilloscope, the vacuum tube voltmeter, frequency standards and measurement, signal generators, RC oscillators, the sound level meter, audio analyzers, the stroboscope, microwave measurement tools and connectors and even the humble ‘Variac’ and ‘Banana Plug’. GR’s thirty-year association with ‘Doc’ Edgerton and his team at MIT, developing stroboscopes, is cited by many universities as the model for cooperation between academia and industry for the transfer of technology into viable products. GR engineers contributed the circuit design. There can be very few people that have not seen the Doc’s famous photographs of bullets passing through apples and playing cards, or of milk drops exploding into crown-like structures on impact. These photographs were taken using standard catalogue GR stroboscopes triggered by a GR sound level meter. Every electronic flashgun used on cameras and in photo studios worlwide owes its existence to this partnership. It was against this background of innovation that Brendan’s interest in testing grew. Yet another first for GR was the computer-based printed circuit board test system in 1969. Brendan immediately got involved with this exciting new product that quickly created a new market. He held a number of sales and marketing positions within the company, the name of which was changed to GenRad in the mid 1970s and is now part of Teradyne. Around 1979 he developed an interest in using an economic approach to decision making, following some pioneering work by a GenRad colleague—Dr James Faran. He then developed a training course on test economics which he presented at the Internepcon conference in Brighton, England. When another GenRad colleague, John Zapf, saw the course notes he suggested that Brendan expand on them to create a book. John also made the contact with the McGraw-Hill book Company that led to the first edition of ‘The Economics of Automatic Testing’ in 1982. At the time of publication Brendan was already a regular participant in conferences on electronics test throughout Europe and America and a regular contributor of article to technical journals. He also developed and participated in a regular series of seminars for GenRad, which were a major element of their educational programs, and did some guest lecturing at Brunel and Warwick universities in the UK. In 1992 he established his own consulting and training operation and used very detailed economic modelling to analyse the testing operations of clients and taught them how to apply the techniques themselves. He moved to Ireland in 1998 where he spent a few more years in the test arena. He retired a few years ago but keeps busy with a bit of consulting, a keen interest in photography and some promotional work.