Aerospace Industry

The aerospace industry has unique requirements for product / fleet safety and reliability, therefore, strict procedures and analyses have to be carried out for design of aerospace grade systems.

Standards and regulatory requirements guide the safety analysis process, including risk analyses and expensive tests. This drives up the cost of aerospace equipment.

Another outcome of the complex process is long design time and service cycles that create obsolescence challenges. Aircraft design time from initial concept to the point of airworthiness certification can exceed a decade. During this time, production of many components is stopped, and replacements have to be found, tested and certified.

Furthermore, expensive spare parts with long procurement times require careful planning of fleet logistics.

Therefore, safety, reliability and maintainability assessments during the design process are crucial for optimal product design, reducing cost, risk, and time to market.

A key term in aerospace functional safety analysis is Design Assurance Level (DAL) (sometimes referred to as Development Assurance Level). DAL is defined in standards DO-178B and DO-254. DAL is the aerospace variant of Safety Integrity Level (SIL) which is defined in IEC 61508. DAL requirements are defined for software and hardware based on the risk that software or hardware failures may pose.
Risk may be reduced by mitigating failure modes with potential severe effects, adding redundancies, fault tolerance, and Built In Tests (BITs) for fast failure detection and isolation.

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Defense Industry

Defense equipment must be operational at all times, for the required mission duration, and under any environmental conditions.

Furthermore, failure of defense equipment can lead to severe consequences. Therefore, high safety standards have to be upheld. This can be achieved only if reliability and safety are embedded features that have been designed into the product.

Reliability and safety are achieved by incorporating fault tolerance, Built In Tests (BITs), high-quality components, and rugged designs.

Another aspect of the defense industry is the need for extensive fleet maintenance. Defense systems have long life cycles, sometimes exceeding 50 years. Maintenance and logistics programs for such fleets can be quite expensive.

Designing systems for long lifecycles, multi-tier maintenance and high availability requires a holistic view of the system operation and maintenance. BQR’s software allows to model such systems and gain important insights that can reduce cost, design time, and field failures.

BQR’s services and software are used by leading defense manufacturers for reliability and availability assessments of C4I systems, telecommunication networks, and aerospace electronics. Furthermore, BQR provides maintenance, logistics, and spare parts optimization for the defense sector.

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Electronics Industry

The electronics industry is one of the largest global industries. Almost all man-made devices include electronics for sensing, control, operation, and actuation.
The electronics industry is highly competitive, and OEMs are hard-pressed to produce high-quality products in a short time to market.
The classic way to achieve product reliability is to conduct accelerated life tests in specialized labs. However, these tests consume a lot of time and money.
Improving product reliability and robustness by simulation


BQR offers software and services to eliminate circuit design errors during the design stage. This is achieved by:

Calculating electrical stresses for each component (Power, Voltage, Current, and Temperature) using BQR’s CircuitHawk circuit simulator
Derating analysis for electronic components based on the above stress results
Automated advanced DRC and ERC (Design Rule Check & Electrical Rules Check) that detect hidden design errors
Automated Schematic and Design Review & Analysis Driven by Electrical Stress Simulation


Analyzing and improving product Safety

Electronic devices provide critical functionalities, and device failures can harm the asset and even loss of lives.
Standard methods exist for the safety analysis of electronic circuits including FMEA/FMECA (Failure Mode Effects Analysis) and FTA (Fault Tree Analysis).
BQR offers software and services for the safety analysis of electronic circuits down to component level. BQR software includes plug-in modules to popular eCAD systems to automatically receive design data directly and concurrently from the design, saving time and money which shorten the design cycle.

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Cyber Industry

The goal of Cybersecurity is to protect systems, networks, and software from digital attacks. When designing a critical system, cybersecurity aspects have to be accounted for.



Cybersecurity is conceptually very similar to Safety, therefore the tools used for safety and risk analysis can be used for identifying and mitigating cyber weaknesses and single points of failure.

Risk Analysis – Organize threats by severity and probability using Failure Mode Effects Analysis (FMEA) method
Layers of Protection – analyze combinations of events using Fault Tree method
Testability Analysis – ensure full coverage and threat isolation capability of your monitoring system

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Medical Industry

Medical devices are required to comply with high standards of safety and reliability. Failure to meet safety requirements can have catastrophic consequences for the health and well-being of patients.

The regulatory safety requirements depend on the medical device classification. Class I devices have the lowest potential to harm patients, and class III devices have the highest. Therefore, safety requirements for class III devices are stricter than class II or class I devices.

Furthermore, early identification of design flaws saves a lot of time and money compared to product recalls and lawsuits.

Therefore, risk analysis should be incorporated into the design process of medical devices.

Another issue that medical device Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) face is the difficulty of maintaining worldwide fleets of medical devices (for example: imaging systems). Logistic support of distributed fleets can be quite expensive.

Maintenance optimization requires a multidisciplinary analysis of the fleet including failure modes and effects, failure distributions, repair and procurement turnaround times, spare parts demand, and cost associated with spare parts, equipment failures, maintenance manpower, support equipment, and transportation.

BQR provides solutions for reliability and maintainability analyses and optimization.


Performance and Risk Management

Hospitals and medical centers provide a wide range of services, each having its own procedure.

BQR’s tools allow you to review the procedures, identify weak points, and improve performance and patient satisfaction by:

-Identifying harmful actions
-Analyzing unsafe conditions (Error-prone, process failure)
-Intervening to prevent harm
-Monitoring outcomes that prevent harm

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Oil & Gas Industry

The oil & gas industry is a highly competitive sector that suffered profit margin reduction in recent years. Asset downtime incurs high costs due to lost production, direct maintenance costs, and possible environmental penalties. Optimization of asset logistics and maintenance can reduce downtime thereby increasing productivity and profit at an affordable cost.



There is a gap in current asset management approaches due to a lack of connection between reliability, maintenance, and lifecycle costs (CAPEX & OPEX). BQR’s apmOptimizer software can overcome this gap by enabling asset performance optimization that integrates production efficiency, operational availability, reliability, preventive maintenance, inspection, spare parts, and Lifecycle Cost (LCC) throughout the asset’s lifecycle phases.



Another key concern in the O&G industry is safety. O&G facilities include heavy machinery, rotating equipment, and flammable materials. Risk analyses are routinely conducted regarding safety and environmental effects. BQR’s Failure Mode Effects Analysis (FMEA), Failure Modes, Effects and Criticality Analysis (FMECA), and Fault Tree Analysis (FTA) software helps to easily conduct such analyses, identify risk drivers, and calculate event probabilities.

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Automotive Industry

As vehicles become increasingly sophisticated, the complexity of modern automobiles continues to rise, with many now featuring dozens of Electronic Control Units (ECUs). This trend is expected to accelerate, especially with the integration of autonomous driving systems.

Safety First

With heightened complexity comes increased risk. Conducting thorough functional safety analyses, as outlined in ISO 26262, is essential for identifying potential hardware and software failures. This proactive approach enables manufacturers to evaluate the reliability of critical safety systems. Insufficient safety measures can lead to severe consequences, including dangerous incidents, costly fleet recalls, and damage to a brand’s reputation.

To ensure safety, two primary strategies are employed:

1. Eliminating High-Risk Failure Modes: This often necessitates redesigning equipment to mitigate potential risks.

2. Reducing Failure Occurrence and Severity: Implementing fault tolerance and redundancy can effectively lower the likelihood and impact of failures.

Reliability and Maintenance

In the competitive automotive landscape, maintainability is a crucial concern for consumers. No one wants frequent trips to the garage or prolonged repair times. Therefore, focusing on reliability and maintainability is vital for customer satisfaction and brand loyalty.

Safety, reliability, and maintainability analyses should be integral components of the automotive design process.

BQR's Solutions

BQR offers a suite of professional services and software designed to meet the specific needs of the automotive industry, including:

• Schematic Review and Design Error Detection: Identifying critical errors in automotive electronics.

• Component Derating and MTBF Prediction: Ensuring optimal performance and lifespan of components.

• Testability Analysis: Optimizing Built-In Test (BIT) and Automatic Test Equipment (ATE) for effective fault isolation.

• Functional Safety Analysis Tools: Complying with ISO 26262 to enhance reliability and safety.

• Statistical Analysis of Failure and Maintenance History: Supporting effective service planning.

• Maintenance and Logistics Optimization: Streamlining operations for fleet management.

By integrating these analyses and tools, automotive manufacturers can enhance their design processes, ultimately leading to safer, more reliable vehicles that meet the demands of today’s consumers.

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Railway Industry

The railway industry is a captivating blend of intricate locomotives, signaling systems, passenger and cargo cars, and expansive tracks. With stringent safety and reliability requirements, the industry aims to prevent serious incidents while addressing the growing demand for high-quality public transportation.

To achieve these goals, integrating safety and reliability into the design processes for rolling stock, signaling systems, and tracks is essential. Optimizing maintenance for trackside equipment—often spread over vast distances—is crucial. Reducing equipment restoration time enhances the quality of service and minimizes the risk of dangerous failures.

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Industry Standards Supported by Our Software:

• CARE®: Supports compliance with EN 50126, 50128, and 50129 standards for RAMS (Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, and Safety) analyses, including Safety Integrity Level (SIL) requirements. Our software helps achieve SIL4, the highest safety standard, which necessitates redundancy and regular inspections for safe operation.

• fiXtress® and Synthelyzer™ ECAD Plugin: Employ the Telcordia 3 MTBF prediction method for improved reliability assessments.

Our software solutions empower the railway industry to meet safety and reliability standards while facilitating efficient maintenance practices.

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Telecom Industry

Most telecom companies operate on a 24/7 basis, so telecom systems must feature high reliability, fault tolerance, availability, service life, and low recovery time.
High performance of telecom systems is achieved by incorporating two concepts:

Design For Reliability
The design process of telecom equipment should incorporate reliability analysis and design reviews. This can prevent expensive field failures and recalls.
BQR offers software and professional services for design error detection of electronic boards via circuit simulation.
Additionally, BQR’s software modules can calculate the expected reliability of equipment and networks.
Design for Maintainability
As the size of data centers increases, maintenance becomes a challenge. Consider hard drives: it is not uncommon for a data center to have more than 1 million hard drives. Assuming a Mean Time To Failure (MTTF) of 1 million hours for hard drives and a constant failure rate, one hard drive is expected to fail in the data center every hour. A similar estimate shows that a switch will fail in the facility every week.
Optimizing the maintenance strategy can save a lot of money and reduce downtime.
BQR’s professional services and software can help to optimize the supply chains, spare parts, inspections, and preventive maintenance.

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Discover the industry standards our software follows, along with case studies, blog posts, and more:

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