Some 50 years ago saw a series of rapid advances in design automation technology setting the stage for generations of reliable computers. Over the intervening years progress in the field continued to deal with the advancing complexity of the technology. This success in design automation was based on capturing or encapsulating complex designs into components to be managed in a larger design. On the other hand, in the past, power was never seen as a limitation yet this now looms as a major problem. Looking at the future, designer productivity and design complexity remain a central limitation on product development especially for specialized system applications (SoC type). Power presents a new challenge especially to the same emerging system applications. We look at these issues both in the context of the past and possibilities for the future.