As semiconductor industry folks know, Synopsys is a behemoth of a company. At $5.84B in FY2023 revenue (FY Nov-Oct), approximately 20,000 employees and a market cap of about $74B, it leads the silicon-to-systems design solutions space within the industry. From humble beginnings in 1986 as a disruptive startup, the company has… Read More
Electronic Design Automation
Keysight EDA Connect World Tour
Video webinars are a main staple to learn what’s new about EDA tools and methodologies, but there’s nothing quite like meeting in person, where you can ask questions and gauge the expertise of the presenters. I was delighted to learn that Keysight is planning a literal world tour to update EDA customers and prospects on what they … Read More
Will the Package Kill my High-Frequency Chip Design?
Understanding the electromagnetic (EM) coupling between various elements of a high-frequency semiconductor device is vital for meeting design specifications and ensuring reliable operation in the field. These EM interactions include not only the silicon chip but also extend to the package that encloses it. However, it may… Read More
The Transformation Model for IP-Centric Design
Semiconductor designs have been progressing over time to address wider product varieties and designs with increasing complexity. Organizations have been addressing intense time-to-market pressures by leveraging globally dispersed team resources. The project-centric design methodology, which once worked well with … Read More
Achieving a Unified Electrical/Mechanical PCB Design Flow – The Siemens Digital Industries Software View
Let’s face it, designs are getting harder, much harder. Gone are the days when the electrical and mechanical design of a system occurred separately. Maybe ten years ago this practice was acceptable. Once the electrical design was completed (either the chip or the board) the parameters associated with the design were then given… Read More
Information Flow Tracking at RTL. Innovation in Verification
Explicit and implicit sneak paths to leak or compromise information continue to represent a threat to security. This paper looks a refinement of existing gate level information flow tracking (IFT) techniques extended to RTL, encouraging early-stage security optimization. Paul Cunningham (Senior VP/GM, Verification at … Read More
Making UVM faster through a new configuration system
The Universal Verification Methodology (UVM) is a popular way to help verify SystemVerilog designs, and it includes a configuration system that unfortunately has some speed and usage issues. Rich Edelman from Siemens EDA wrote a detailed 20-page paper on the topic of how to avoid these issues, and I’ve gone through it to… Read More
SPIE 2023 Buzz – Siemens Aims to Break Down Innovation Barriers by Extending Design Technology Co-Optimization
Preventing the propagation of systematic defects in today’s semiconductor design-to-fabrication process requires many validation, analysis and optimization steps. Tools involved in this process can include design rule checking (DRC), optical proximity correction (OPC) verification, mask writing and wafer printing… Read More
Preventing SOC Schedule Delays Using the Cloud
In my previous article, we touched on ways to pull in the schedule. This time I’d like to analyze how peak usage affects project timeline and cost. The above graph is based on real pattern taken from one development week in Annapurna Labs 5nm Graviton.
The Graph shows the number of variable servers per hour per day. There’s a baseline… Read More
Giving Back – The Story of One Silicon Valley Veteran’s Journey
The concept of giving back is something many of us have contemplated. Giving back to the community or to support a particular cause. How to respond to those inquiries from our alma mater is another example. These conversations typically focus on giving money to provide needed support. As engineers, we are surrounded by a massive… Read More
Facing the Quantum Nature of EUV Lithography