Cabelio

Wire harness design has historically been gatekept by legacy CAD: SolidWorks Electrical, Zuken, RapidHarness, Altium. Expensive licenses, weeks of training, weeks of design time, and a separate email-driven loop to get a quote and route the design to a manufacturer. Cabelio collapses the whole flow. A web-first design tool with built-in libraries for connectors, wires, contacts, passives, and accessories. Simplified connection diagrams. Bundling diagrams with overwrap, length, splices, and labels. Build notes. A review process with company-specific approval workflows. Instant auto-quoting. And one click to route the design to manufacturing: Cabelio Systems for fast US builds, or overseas partners for lower-cost, longer-lead work. Groundplane is designing and building it as our own product.

What it does

• Browser-based design: no installs, no per-seat licenses, no weeks of onboarding
• Built-in libraries for connectors, wires, cables, contacts, passive components, and accessories
• Simplified connection diagrams with drag-and-connect pin mapping
• Bundling diagrams where overwrap, length, splices, labels, and breakouts get specified
• Build notes that travel with the design through to manufacturing
• Company-specific review and approval workflows with revision tracking
• Instant itemized auto-quoting across multiple manufacturing tiers
• One-click routing to Cabelio Systems (fast US build) or overseas partners (cheaper, longer lead)
• Free design tier; pay only for what you manufacture

Hard parts

From browser to factory floor. Every design has to land as two things at once: a human-readable work instruction that an IPC-trained tech builds from, and a machine program that automated wire-processing equipment runs without a human in the loop. Both come from the same design data, but they need different things from it. The instructions carry callouts, tolerances, and the photographic context a tech reads at the bench. The machine programs carry quantized cut lengths, strip dimensions, contact assignments, and timing data the equipment consumes directly. One design, two outputs, both consumable downstream without a human bridging the gap.

The component library. Connectors, contacts, wires, sleeves, and accessories are the alphabet of the design. Getting the library right means tracking thousands of MIL-spec and commercial parts with the geometry, pin counts, current and voltage ratings, mating partners, and stock availability that downstream quoting and manufacturing need. Wrong data here propagates straight into wrong quotes and wrong builds, so the curation effort is real and ongoing.

The quote. Turning a parametric design into a costed BOM in real time, across multiple manufacturing tiers, with accuracy good enough to ship the order, is the connective tissue between the design tool and the factory. The same engine has to model fast-turn US labor at Cabelio Systems and lower-cost overseas labor with different shipping and lead-time profiles. Get this right and the email loop disappears.

At a glance

Type

Cloud-based design SaaS for wire harnesses

Workflow

Design, bundle, approve, quote, manufacture

Library

Connectors, wires, cables, contacts, passives, accessories

Approval

Company-specific review workflows with revision tracking

Quoting

Instant, itemized, multiple manufacturing tiers

Manufacturing routing

Cabelio Systems (US, fast) or overseas partners (cheaper, longer lead)

Pricing model

Free design tier; pay per manufactured order

Status

In active development; waitlist-based onboarding

What's next

Cabelio is in active development. The first production orders will route to Cabelio Systems when both go live. Sign up at cabelio.com to join the waitlist.