ECAD, Inc.

ECAD, Inc., based in Santa Clara, California, was an early vendor of electronic design automation software.

Eventually, in a merger with SDA, it became Cadence Design Systems.

ECAD was founded in August 1982 by Paul Huang, Ping Chao, and Glen M. Antle,[1] who had worked at Texas Instruments, ITT, Teledyne, Data General, and (just before founding ECAD), the microelectronics products division of Systems Engineering Laboratories (SEL) in Sunnyvale, California.

In 1982, SEL was acquired by Gould Inc., and part of the CAD group spun out as ECAD.

ECAD sold only software, an unusual business tactic at this time.