Periodically Mentor does us all a big favor by commissioning a survey of verification engineers across the world to illuminate trends in verification. This is valuable not only to satisfy our intellectual curiosity but also to help convince managers and finance mandarins that our enthusiasm to invest in new methods and tools … Read More
Walden Rhines on the Automotive Electronics Landscape
Mentor President and CEO Walden Rhines gave a comprehensive overview of the automotive electronics landscape at the Mentor Integrated Electrical Solutions Forum (IESF) in Plymouth, Mich., this week. A key focal point of Rhines’ comments was the twin industry disruptors: EVs and AVs.
A Texas Instruments alum, Rhines described… Read More
High-Level Synthesis for Automotive SoCs
Some of the world’s most complex Systems-on-Chip (SoCs) are being developed for automotive applications. These SoCs have heterogeneous architectures with a variety of processors and accelerators that do real-time image processing for assisted and autonomous driving applications. The Bosch Visiontec team, in Sophia Antipolis,… Read More
Fusing CMOS IC and MEMS Design for IoT Edge Devices
In my 34 years in IC and EDA, it never ceases to amaze me as to how ingenious designers can be with what is given them. Mentor, a Siemens business, has released a wonderful white paper that is proof of this yet again. The white paper steps through how one of their customers, MEMSIC, used the Tanner tool suite to develop a combination CMOS… Read More
Project Management Tools for Analog IP Verification
Large SoC design teams typically have a cadre of project managers to oversee all facets of functional verification — e.g., specification, reviews, directed testbench development, automated (pseudorandom) testcase generation, HDL coverage measurement and reporting, and bug identification/tracking database management.… Read More
Why Open and Supported Interfaces Matter
Back in the early 1980’s during the nascent years of electronic design automation (EDA), I worked at Texas Instruments supporting what would become their merchant ASIC business. Back then, life was a bit different. The challenge we faced was to make our ASIC library available on as many EDA flows as we could to give as many users as… Read More
Automotive IC Design Requires a Unique EDA Tool Emphasis
Semiwiki readers are no doubt very familiar with the increasing impact of the automotive market on the semiconductor industry. The magnitude and complexity of the electronic systems that will be integrated into upcoming vehicle designs reflects the driver automation, safety, and entertainment features that are in growing… Read More
Whitepaper : The True Costs of Process Node Migration
Mentor, A Siemens Business, just released a new white paper entitled, “The True Costs of Process Node Migration” written by John Ferguson. This is a good quick read that highlights some of the key areas that are often over looked when contemplating a shift of process nodes for your next design.
When considering a shift to a more advanced… Read More
Emulation makes the What to See List
The analysts at Gary Smith EDA produce an annual What To See List for DAC and I quickly noticed that all three major EDA vendors were included on the list for the specific category of emulation. The big problem that emulation addresses is the ability to run in hardware an early version of your SoC so that software developers can get access… Read More
High Density Advanced Packaging Trends
Thursdays at the Design Automation Conference (DAC) are always a good time to catch up on areas of technology which are adjacent to that which you normally work. The exhibit floor is over and you have more time to spend in seminars. At this year’s DAC, I took advantage of a half day seminar put on by Mentor, a Siemens business, … Read More