Updates, releases, and thoughts from the Trace team.
Trace 2.1 is our most capable release yet — native design files, team workspaces, IDF exchange, project artifacts, advanced layout, and one-click manufacturing. Upgrade now: Trace 1.x builds are deprecated in a few weeks. Walkthrough videos on every major feature are coming soon.
Over the last few weeks, Trace has been featured in Daily Scanner, Business Insider, and Yahoo Finance. Three Howard University engineers rebuilding the AI-native design and manufacturing layer for hardware. Inbound is up 4x. Here's what's happening.
Length matching for high-speed buses like DDR, USB, and PCIe has always been a trace-by-trace chore. Trace now has Matched Length Groups: group a set of nets, pick a target, and match the whole bus interactively - even when signals are split by series termination resistors.
Trace has acquired Schemagic and its founder Hugh Phan. Schemagic built a fast following by converting component datasheets into KiCad symbols and footprints. Hugh is now bringing that energy — and his audience — to Trace.
Supply chain disruption is the conversation this quarter. Everyone is treating it like a procurement problem. It is not. By the time a shortage hits your BOM, the real decision was made six months earlier in the EDA tool. Design-time supply chain awareness is the only actual fix.
Trace now submits orders directly to PCBWay through their Partner API. Fabrication, turnkey assembly, autofilled parameters, live quotes, freight, and fabrication progress — all from inside the editor.
Trace is partnering with Pikkolo Assembly -- a US-based, software-first assembly house in Denver -- as our first manufacturing partner. Design a board, click ship, get it populated in America.
2,800+ downloads in week one, 245 daily actives, and now we're shipping 1.2 with plan mode, a rewritten chat UI, and multi-tab streaming.
A friend of mine spent seven months designing a simple PCB that fits in a wand. The firmware took a weekend with AI. There are millions of engineers like him, and the tools haven't changed in decades.
We're excited to share that Trace has been backed by Founders, Inc (f.inc).
We officially launched Trace. The fastest way from idea to manufactured board.
We're releasing v1 and onboarding a lot of people in our alpha.
A look at how Trace started and where we're heading. Shipping soon.