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China aims to shake US grip on chip design tools

Daniel Nenni

Admin
Staff member

Veteran engineers and high-level executives are leaving top U.S. chip design toolmakers for Chinese rivals as Beijing looks to break America's near monopoly on this key segment of the semiconductor industry.

Three Chinese startups established since Sept. last year were founded by or have hired executives and engineers from Synopsys and Cadence Design Systems of the U.S., the world's two biggest makers of electronic design automation (EDA) tools, as such software is known.

These startups include Nanjing-based X-Epic, Shanghai Hejian Industrial Software, and Hefei-based Advanced Manufacturing EDA Co., or Amedac, in which Synopsys owns a stake.

The push to recruit U.S. chip tool talent comes as Washington's crackdown on Huawei Technologies exposes key weaknesses in China's chipmaking ecosystem, including in EDA tools, which are used to design integrated circuits, printed circuit boards and other electronic systems.

America has long dominated the segment, with Synopsys, Cadence, Mentor Graphics and Ansys controlling some 90% of the global market for EDA tools. Mentor was taken over by Siemens in 2017 but maintains extensive R&D operations in the U.S. These four companies own much of the IP needed for chip development, and count the world's top chip developers as clients.
 
Public isn't aware that China can make elite quality stuff. Why they haven't had success so far in semiconductor manufacturing is anyone's guess.
 
Any opinions on how much IP theft will occur in this area as it has occurred in other semiconductor areas as verified by numerous court cases with damages awarded? Are there any ongoing or pending cases at the present time?
 
Any opinions on how much IP theft will occur in this area as it has occurred in other semiconductor areas as verified by numerous court cases with damages awarded? Are there any ongoing or pending cases at the present time?

I'd say this is not what most people think. Yes, pirated Cadence is still a business standard in the industry in China, but when it comes to the new wave of Chinese EDA companies, they don't aim for that market.

It's better to say that EDA users who "grew out" of using few years old pirated EDAs, and picking scraps from certain FTPs are now wanting to get the same treatment what first tier "big-semi" gets from top EDA vendors: custom made features, and integration with other high-end 3rd party tools.
 
China is investing in the EDA supply chain through acquisitions and internal growth. Unfortunately they are chasing the puck and will never catch it.
 
China has lots of rare metals (tungsten) and a history of working it. They are underachieving in design tools.
 
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