Increasingly complex heterogeneous packaging solutions have proved essential to meeting the rapidly scaling requirements for automotive electronics. Perhaps there is no better example of this than advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) that are found in most new cars. In a recent paper published by Siemens EDA, they … Read More





What the Heck is Collaborative Specification?
It’s been quite a while since I talked with Agnisys CEO and founder Anupam Bakshi, when he described their successful first user group meeting. I reached out to him recently to ask what’s new at Agnisys, and his answer was “collaborative specification.” I told him that I wasn’t quite sure what that term meant, and he offered to spend… Read More
Autonomous Vehicle Rationale Breaks Down
The latest SmartDrivingCars podcast raised fundamental questions regarding the rationale for developing autonomous cars while debating the various paths to market adoption. The discussion took place between Alain Kornhauser – faculty chair of autonomous vehicle engineering at Princeton University and Adriano Alessandrini,
Podcast EP40: The Semiconductor Supply Chain and the Real Cause of Semiconductor Shortages
Dan and Mike are joined by Malcolm Penn, 50-year semiconductor industry veteran and founder and CEO of Future Horizons. Dan and Mike explore the evolution of the semiconductor supply chain, how we got to the current state of shortages and what the future may hold. Drawing on his substantial knowledge of the industry, Malcolm makes… Read More
The Semiconductor Shortage False Narrative!
The semiconductor shortage has really caught the world’s attention. Friends and family who don’t really know what a semiconductor is now ask me to explain it. This is great news for the semiconductor industry for different reasons which I will discuss here. We can also discuss the downside risks.
First, let’s look at a bit of semiconductor… Read More
Synopsys’ ARC® DSP IP for Low-Power Embedded Applications
On Sep 20th, Synopsys announced an expansion of its DesignWare® ARC® Processor IP portfolio with new 128-bit ARC VPX2 and 256-bit ARC VPX3 DSP Processors targeting low-power embedded SoCs. In 2019, the company had launched a 512-bit ARC VPX5 DSP processor for high-performance signal processing SoCs. Due to the length, format… Read More
Verification Completion: When is enough enough? Part I
Verification is a complex task that takes the majority of time and effort in chip design. Veriest shares customer views on what this means. We are an ASIC services company, and we have the opportunity to work on multiple projects and methodologies, interfacing with different experts.
In this “Verification Talks”… Read More
Auto Semiconductor Shortage Worsens
The shortage of semiconductors for automotive applications is getting worse. Recent statements from major automakers:
- General Motors significantly cut production at eight North American plants earlier this month due to the semiconductor shortage. GM expects North American vehicle production in the second half of the year
An ISA-like Accelerator Abstraction. Innovation in Verification
A processor ISA provides an abstraction against which to verify an implementation. We look here at a paper extending this concept to accelerators, for verification of how these interact with processors and software. Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys… Read More
Electromigration and IR Drop Analysis has a New Entrant
My first IR drop analysis was back in the early 1980s at Intel, where I had to manually model the parasitics of the VDD and VSS interconnect for all of the IO cells that our team was designing in a graphics chip, then I ran that netlist in a SPICE simulator using transient analysis, measuring the bounce in VSS and droop in VDD levels as all… Read More
Intel’s Pearl Harbor Moment