EDA mergers: Accelicon acquired by Agilent

Agilent acquired EEsof back in 1999, now the EEsof group acquired Accelicon on December 1, 2011. The terms of the deal are not disclosed.

SPICE circuit simulators are only as accurate as their models and algorithms. On the model side we have Accelicon that provides EDA tools to create SPICE models based on silicon measurements:

• Model Quality Assurance
• Model Builder Program
• DFM-aware PDK verification
• SPICE Model Services

Capacitance and IV curves for MOS devices

Accelicon has partnered with many other EDA companies to fit into standard flows:

• Synopsys HSPICE
• Cadence Spectre
• Mentor Eldo
• Berkeley DA AFS
• IPL Alliance
• MOSFET models: BSIM3v3, BSIM4, BSISOI, BJT
• DRC/LVS tools: Assura, Calibre, Hercules

The Advanced Model Analysis flow:

SPICE model services include a test chip design, measurements from silicon, then running through Model Builder Program (MBP) and Model Quality Assurance (MQA):

Competitors
We have several EDA companies competing in this space:

• Silvaco – UTMOST IV
• Agilent – ICCAP
• ProPlus – BSIMPro, BSIMProPlus
• Synopsys – Aurora
• Accelicon – MQA, MBP

Summary
I don’t see any disruption in the EDA business with this acquisition because we have so many sources for SPICE models. Accelicon founder Dr. Xisheng Zhang started the company in 2002 and hopefully received a fitting reward for building up the business over the past 10 years.

See the Wiki page of all known EDA mergers and acquisitions.