The numbers for smartphone sales in Q3 are starting to roll in. These are in units and not yet revenue (let alone profit) numbers although everyone down to Sony is for sure profitable. Samsung is running away with the volume, selling more than Apple, Huawei and Sony put together. One name that is missing is Motorola (Google) which … Read More
Carbon has Six Weeks of ARM, not to Mention Imagination and MIPS
As George E.P. Box said, “essentially all models are wrong but some are useful.” That is certainly the case with Carbon’s models. For processors they have two models, one that is fast (but not timing-accurate) and one that is accurate (but not fast). But both are useful.
Carbon attended the ARM TechCon in Santa… Read More
ICCAD at 30: Alberto Looks Back and Forward
At ICCAD earlier this week, CEDA sponsored a talk by Alberto Sangiovanni-Vincentelli looking back over the last 30 years (it is the 30th anniversary of ICCAD) and looking to the future. As is always the case in these sorts of presentations, the retrospective contained a lot more detail than the going forward part. Clayton Christensen… Read More
IJTAG, Testing Large SoCs
Test is the Rodney Dangerfield of EDA, it doesn’t get any respect. All designs need to be tested but somehow synthesis, routing, analog layout and the rest are the sexy areas. In my spoof all purpose EDA keynote address I even dissed it:You are short on time so slip in a quick mention of manufacturing test. Who knows anything … Read More
ARM adopting SpyGlass IP Kit, joining TSMC’s soft IP9000 Quality Assessment Program
More than one year old now, TSMC’s soft IP quality assessment program is a joint effort between TSMC and Atrenta to deploy a series of SpyGlass checks that create detailed reports of the completeness and robustness of soft IP. This soft IP quality program has been the first to be initiated by a Silicon foundry on other than “Hard IP”,… Read More
Solido and TSMC for 6-Sigma Memory Design
Solido Design Automation and TSMC recently published an article in EE Times describing how Solido’s High-Sigma Monte Carlo tool is used with TSMC PDK’s to achieve high-yield, high-performance memory design. This project has been a big part of my life for the past three years and it is time for a victory lap!
In TSMC 28nm, 20nm and … Read More
Embedding 100K probes in FPGA-based prototypes
As RTL designs in FPGA-based ASIC prototypes get bigger and bigger, the visibility into what is happening inside the IP is dropping at a frightening rate. Where designers once had several hundred observation probes per million gates, those same several hundred probes – or fewer if deeper signal captures are needed – are now spread… Read More
A Most Significant Man
Most of us live perfectly good lives without distinction, fame, or note. Others rack up the honors, filling their walls and resumes with recognition of their brilliance. Like Dr. Janusz Rajski.
Rajski is the director of engineering for the test products at Mentor Graphics, an IEEE Fellow, and the inventor of embedded deterministic… Read More
Did the MIPS acquisition just doom Vivante?
By now, you’ve probably read about the Imagination Technologies acquisition of MIPS somewhere, hopefully in the Eric Esteve article here. There’s an interesting side effect not being talked about much.… Read More
Should ARM care about MIPS acquisition?
It was not really a surprise to learn that, finally, MIPS have been sold, as the company was officially for sale since April 2012. Nevertheless, the interesting part of this news comes from the buyer’ identity: Imagination Technologies. Imagination is an UK based company, like ARM, selling processor IP cores, like ARM, but the … Read More
LRCX- Mediocre, flattish, long, U shaped bottom- No recovery in sight yet-2025?