When I first heard about Presto Engineering I was enamored by a statement on their web site that claimed that one of their secured solutions included, “The ability to incorporate your secrets without knowing them”. If Mr. Spock would have been in the room his eyebrow would have certainly raised. Indeed, what does that statement … Read More





An Informal Update
I mentioned back in June that Synopsys had launched a blog on formal verification, intended to demystify the field and provide help in understanding key concepts. It’s been a few months, time to check in on some of their more recent posts.
First up, it feels like they are finding their groove. Relaxed style, useful topics but now with… Read More
Is there anything in VLSI layout other than pushing polygons? (2)
One of the important changes that happen between 1984 and 1988 is the hardware platforms development. Calma evolved, mainframe S140 with 2 combined monitors per terminal in S280 with 2 individual monitors per terminal. This meant that from noisy and darker rooms we move to more quiet and lighted rooms. We doubled the speed and the… Read More
Semiconductor IP on Fortune’s 2017 100 Fastest-Growing Companies List!
The Semiconductor IP market has always been a big draw for SemiWiki readership and I expect that to continue. One of the more interesting companies we have covered over the past 6+ years is CEVA, who is now on Fortune’s 2017 100 Fastest-Growing Companies List. In fact, CEVA is the ONLY semiconductor IP company on the list and they join… Read More
Photonics Summit Delivers High-Bandwidth Discussion on State of Silicon Photonics
On September 6, 2017, Cadence Design Systems, Lumerical Solutions and PhoeniX Software hosted their second Photonics Summit. As with last year’s summit, this was a two-day event, with the first day including in a myriad of photonics presentations and the second day being a hands-on workshop. The hands-on workshop taught attendees… Read More
Adoption, Architecture and Origami
Last week I sat in on Oski’s latest in a series of “Decoding Formal” sessions. Judging by my first experience, they plan and manage these events very well. Not too long (~3 hours of talks), good food (DishDash), good customer content, a good forward-looking topic and a very entertaining wrap-up talk.… Read More
TSMC Teamwork Translates to Technical Triumph
Most people think that designing successful high speed analog circuits requires a mixture of magic, skill and lots of hard work. While this might be true, in reality it also requires a large dose of collaboration among each of the members of the design, tool and fabrication panoply. This point was recently made abundantly clear … Read More
eFabless and Silego $15,000 Go Configure Design Challenge Series!
The eFabless and Silego “Go Configure Design Challenge Series” is the first of its kind to allow a global community of designers to implement widely used functions using GreenPAK™ Configurable Mixed-signal ICs (“CMICs”) and its intuitive drag-and-drop software GUI. The efabless platform will serve as the crowd source design… Read More
Deal Struck for Sale of Toshiba NAND to Bain Apple and Others
What does it mean for the skyrocketing memory sector? In a last minute plot twist, Bain capital appears to be the winner in the auction of the Toshiba memory unit. The Bain consortium includes a strange cast of characters including Apple, Dell, Seagate, Kingston Technology, Innovation Network Corp of Japan and Development Bank… Read More
2017 Semiconductor Growth Approaching 20 Percent!
The 2017 semiconductor market is shaping up as the strongest since 2010 – when the market grew 32% as it bounced back from the 2008-2009 downturn. According to World Semiconductor Trades Statistics (WSTS), the second quarter 2017 semiconductor market was up 5.8% from 1Q 2017 and up 23.7% from a year ago. Much of the market vitality… Read More
Should the US Government Invest in Intel?