Altium

Altium Limited is an Australian owned public software company that provides PC-based electronics design software for engineers. Founded in Tasmania, Australia 1985, Altium now has regional headquarters in Australia, China, United States, Europe, and Japan, with resellers in all other major markets. The company was known as "Protel" until 2001.

History

Nicholas Martin, an electronics designer working at the University of Tasmania in the 1980s, recognized that the tools then available limited the ability to design printed circuit boards, either through a difficult manual process, or by requiring high-priced software that required expensive mainframe computers. With the development of the personal computer, Martin saw an opportunity to make the design of electronics product affordable, by marrying the techniques of electronics design to the PC platform. In 1985 he founded Protel, launching the company's first product later that same year — a DOS-based printed circuit board (PCB) layout and design tool.