Of course if you are in the business of selling high-level synthesis (HLS) tools then the obvious answer is immediately. Start at 9am tomorrow morning. But a more realistic answer is when you are having to do something completely new. If you are working on a legacy design, perhaps with pre-existing IP, then moving the design up to … Read More



Non-volatile Memory in the Internet of Things
You have probably heard of the Internet of Things or IoT. This is the future world in which not only are our computers and smartphones connected to the internet, but all sort of other things like thermostats, medical monitors, smart car-keys and soil analyzers. What these “things” have in common is that, unlike computers… Read More
What Do Brazil and Sweden Have in Common?
Well, Sweden is not noted for its carnivals, Brazil is not noted for it’s tall blonde blue-eyed women, Sweden’s climate is not great for growing sugar cane and Brazil’s isn’t great for reindeer. Both countries speak languages with odd-sounding vowels but they are not the same language. But, ding, Jasper… Read More
How many consortia does POWER need to succeed?
Sometimes press releases just make me scratch my head. Today’s example comes from IBM: after tying PowerPC and Power.org in knots for almost 20 years with rules and restrictive licensing, IBM breaks ranks and sets up ANOTHER consortium with different players.… Read More
ClioSoft at GenApSys
GenApSys is a biotech company developing proprietary DNA sequencing technology. As part of that they develop their own custom sequencing chips. These have an analog component and like many people they use the Cadence Virtuoso analog design environment for this.
I talked to Hamid Rategh who is GenApSys’s VP engineering.… Read More
The Funnest Bug
We all have a funnest bug we’ve been involved with. I don’t think ‘funnest’ is actually a word but when my kids used to use the word ‘funner’ I didn’t have a good argument as to why it wasn’t a word, it just seemed a word I’d never heard. In fact I have no idea what the rules are… Read More
Challenges of Low Power Network-on-Chip Designs
Everyone understands that as we increasingly focus on the design of mobile devices, there is an increasing focus on low power. But, what is implied in designing for low-power? Designing for low power means we have to work with multiple power domains and multiple clock domains—making our design task more complex. We also must get… Read More
New Media and the Semiconductor Ecosystem!
Gary Smith did a nice write-up on the current state of electronics media. It’s posted on his Gary Smith EDAwebsite. Traditional media certainly is in transition and there is more change to come, definitely. Gary lists me as one of the heroes carrying the flag which is very nice of him to say. In reality though, he missed Paul … Read More
A Brief History of Docea Power
Founders
The founder, Ghislain Kaiser, spent about 10 years at STMicroelectronics, mainly in multimedia groups and for the wireless market. At this time, he was a power expert and tasked with making the chips use less power. The first thing he did was to look at what tools existed on the market. They wanted to use off the shelf tools… Read More
Coke vs. Pepsi; Xilinx vs. Altera
I have many thoughts on this topic, so forgive the word salad that may ensue. I have been thinking about Coca-Cola lately, partly because I bought an old coke machine (I’m one of those guys… pray for my wife). I am amazed that Coke which was founded in 1886, still has a secret recipe. I like that, but boy every time the web reveals the coke… Read More
Flynn Was Right: How a 2003 Warning Foretold Today’s Architectural Pivot