Introduction
When I designed DRAM chips at Intel I wanted to simulate at the worst case process corners to help make my design as robust as possible in order to improve yields. My manager knew what the worst case corners were based on years of prior experience, so that’s what I used for my circuit simulations.… Read More
Electronic Design Automation
Cadence VIP Seminar: next stop after Denali party, August 25th in San Jose
If you did not have the chance to attend the famous Denali party at DAC 2011, you may want to go to Cadence VIP seminar to be held on Thursday, August 25, 2011, from 1:00 – 4:15pm at Cadence Headquarters: 2655 Seely Avenue, San Jose, Building 10. To register, click here. The atmosphere could be slightly different, as during Denali… Read More
OPC Model Accuracy and Predictability – Evolution of Lithography Process Models, Part III
Wyatt Earp probably wasn’t thinking of OPC when he said, “Fast is fine, but accuracy is everything,” but I’ll adopt that motto for this discussion of full-chip OPC and post-OPC verification models.
Accuracy is the difference between the calibrated model prediction and the calibration wafer result. Accuracy depends on several… Read More
ANSYS/Apache
Last week I met with Andrew Yang, erstwhile CEO of Apache Design Systems and now formally President of Apache Design Inc, a wholly owned subsidiary of ANSYS. The merger formally closed at the start of the month. Within ANSYS Apache is positioned as Chip-aware System-level Engineering Simulation. ANSYS is pretty much completely… Read More
How Tektronix uses Hardware Configuration Management tools in an IC flow
Last Monday I sat down with Grego Sanguinetti in Beaverton, Oregon at the campus of Tektronix to hear about how they design their ICs using EDA tools from multiple vendors.… Read More
Best EDA company for work life balance?
What was the first EDA company name that came to your mind after reading that title?
At Forbes magazine they rated both Mentor Graphics and Synopsys in the top 25 best companies for work life balance.
That’s quite an honor for both Mentor and Synopsys so I can say that EDA dominated the list this year.
Here are some of the factors… Read More
Yalta in EDA: but Synopsys ultra dominant in Interface IP territory…
If Cadence is making money with large VIP port-folio, Synopsys has successfully deployed an acquisition strategy to build a large Design IP port-folio. Looking at these acquisitions will help understanding Synopsys positioning in the IP market. When they have started this acquisition campaign, back in 2002, their market share… Read More
Sentinel-PSI Webinar
The last of the current series of webinars is on Sentinel-PSI,IC-Package, Power and Signal Integrity Solution. It will be at 11am Pacific time on Thursday 11th August. It will be conducted by Dr. Tao Su, product manager of the Sentinel products. Dr. Su has many years of experience in the EDA industry and is specialized in power integrity… Read More
August 11th – Hands-on Workshop with Calibre: DRC, LVS, DFM, xRC, ERC
I’ve blogged about the Calibre family of IC design tools before:
Smart Fill replaced Dummy Fill Approach in a DFM Flow
DRC Wiki
Graphical DRC vs Text-based DRC
Getting Real time Calibre DRC Results with Custom IC Editing
Transistor-level Electrical Rule Checking
Who Needs a 3D Field Solver for IC Design?
Prevention is Better… Read More
SNUG outside Silicon Valley
SNUG in Silicon Valley was in March so either you were there or you’ve missed it. But it is the summer (and fall) of SNUG in the rest of the world:
SNUG China (in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen) on August 22nd-30th
SNUG Singapore on August 23rd
SNUG Taiwan (in Hsinchu) on August 25-26th
SNUG Japan (in Tokyo) on September 7th
SNUG … Read More
Flynn Was Right: How a 2003 Warning Foretold Today’s Architectural Pivot