The theme of this year’s DAC was Chips to Systems which is a full circle type of thing since systems companies used to make their own chips. Old school computer companies were the biggest chip makers when I started in the semiconductor industry. IDMs like Motorola and Intel replaced them at the chip level. Shortly after I joined… Read More
Electronic Design Automation
LIVE WEBINAR Maximizing SoC Energy Efficiency: The Role of Realistic Workloads and Massively Parallel Power Analysis
As the complexity of modern System-on-Chip (SoC) designs continues to rise, achieving energy efficiency measured as performance per watt has become a crucial design goal. With the increasing demand for powerful, multifunctional chips, balancing performance with power consumption has become essential. Realistic workloads… Read More
Solido Siemens and the University of Saskatchewan
In my 40 years, I have worked for dozens of companies and just about everyone of them was acquired. Some of the acquisitions were accretive and some were not. Probably the best and most accretive one would be the Solido acquisition by Siemens EDA in 2017. I worked for Solido for ten years reporting to CEO Amit Gupta. I handled Taiwan … Read More
Career in EDA Versus Chip Design: Solving the Dilemma
Chip design and Electronic Design Automation (EDA) are two sides of the same coin in the semiconductor industry. Both fields are critical for developing the advanced integrated circuits (ICs) that power our modern world. This article explores the differences between a career in chip design and EDA, drawing on my personal experience… Read More
Three New Circuit Simulators from Siemens EDA
The week before DAC I had the privilege to take a video call with Pradeep Thiagarajan – Product Manager, Simulation, Custom IC Verification at Siemens EDA to get an update on new simulation products. I’ve been following Solido for years now and knew that they were an early adopter of ML for Monte Carlo simulations with SPICE users.… Read More
Siemens Provides a Complete 3D IC Solution with Innovator3D IC
Heterogeneous multi-die integration is gaining more momentum all the time. The limited roadmap offered by Moore’s Law monolithic, single-die integration has opened the door to a new era of more-than-Moore heterogeneous integration. The prospects offered by this new design paradigm are exciting and the entire ecosystem is… Read More
New EDA Tool for 3D Thermal Analysis
An emerging trend with IC design is the growing use of chiplets and even 3D IC designs, as the disaggregated approach has some economic and performance benefits over a single SoC. There are thermal challenges with using chiplets and 3D IC designs, so that means that thermal analysis has become more important. I just spoke with Michael… Read More
Novelty-Based Methods for Random Test Selection. Innovation in Verification
Coverage improvement effectiveness through randomized testing declines as total coverage improves. Attacking stubborn holes in coverage could be augmented through learned novel test guidance to random test selection. Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former… Read More
Synopsys’ Strategic Advancement with PCIe 7.0: Early Access and Complete Solution for AI and Data Center Infrastructure
In the rapidly evolving world of high-performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI), technological advancements must keep pace with increasing demands for speed, efficiency, and security. Synopsys recently announced the industry’s first complete PCIe 7.0 IP solution. This groundbreaking initiative addresses… Read More
System VIPs are to PSS as Apps are to Formal
In the formal world the core technology is extremely powerful, and specialist users need full access to tackle difficult problems. But for many applications, teams prefer canned solutions built on the core technology yet scalable to non-experts. A similar dynamic appears to be playing out between System VIPs and PSS. PSS, the… Read More
CHIPS Act dies because employees are fired – NIST CHIPS people are probationary