Intento Design builds responsive analog EDA. The ID-Xplore tool is used for analog design acceleration and technology porting at the functional level, helping companies move analog IP quickly between technology nodes and across business units. The Intention view is a simple, elegant, and powerful concept that gives the speed… Read More





Data Breach Laws 0-to-50 States in 16 Years
It has taken the U.S. 16 years to enact Data Breach laws in each state. California led the way, with the first, in 2002 to protect its citizens. Last in line was Alabama, which just signed their law in March 2018. There is no overarching consistent data breach law at the federal level. It is all handled independently by each state. This… Read More
Meltdown, Spectre and Formal
Once again Oski delivered in their most recent Decoding Formal session, kicking off with a talk on the infamous Meltdown and Spectre bugs and possible relevance of formal methods in finding these and related problems. So far I haven’t invested much effort in understanding these beyond a hand-waving “cache and speculative execution”… Read More
RDC – A Cousin To CDC
In a post-silicon bringup, it is customary to bring the design into a known state prior to applying further testing sequences. This is achieved through a Power-on-Reset (POR) or similar reset strategy which translates to initializing all the storage elements to a known state.
During design implementation, varying degrees of… Read More
Artificial Intelligence calls for Smart Interconnect
Artificial Intelligence based systems are driving a metamorphosis in computing, and consequently precipitating a large shift in SOC design. AI training is often done in the cloud and has requirements for handling huge amounts of data with forward and backward data connections. Inference usually occurs at the edge and must be… Read More
Tensilica 5th Generation DSP: Mix of Vision and AI
Cadence has launched the new Tensilica Vision Q6 DSP IP, delivering 1.5x more performance than the former Vision P6 DSP IP and 1.25X better power efficiency. According with Cadence, the mobile industry is moving from traditional feature-based embedded vision to AI-based algorithm, even if all use cases still have mix of vision… Read More
Sometimes a Solver is a Suitable Solution
Traditional, rule based, RC extractors rely on a substantial base of assumptions, which are increasingly proving unreliable. Having accurate RC extraction results for parasitic R’s and C’s is extremely important for ensuring proper circuit operation and for optimizing performance and power. Advanced process nodes are making… Read More
Functional Safety – the Analytics
ISO 26262 is serious stuff, the governing process behind automotive safety. But, as I have observed before, it doesn’t make for light reading. The standard is all about process and V-diagrams, mountains of documentation and accredited experts. I wouldn’t trade a word of it (or my safety) for a more satisfying read, but all that … Read More
Samsung is Starting 7nm Production with EUV in June
There is a report in the Seoul Economic Daily that Samsung has completed development of their 7nm process using EUV and that production will begin in June. What is claimed in the report is:
- The process is installed in the Hwaseong S3 Fab
- Samsung has more than 10 EUV systems installed
- Production starts in June with Qualcomm, Xilinx,
EDA CEO Outlook 2018 Partly Cloudy
The funniest line of the EDA CEO Outlook event was that we should rename our Amazon Echos Wally. Yes Wally is that smart and he remembers pretty much everything. I wish I could rename my Echo Wally because my daughter in-law is named Alexa so we have to turn it off when she is over. The discussion took an interesting turn with EDA in the … Read More
Rapidus, IBM, and the Billion-Dollar Silicon Sovereignty Bet