GDS and LEF/DEF each came about to support data exchange in different types of design flows, custom layout and place & route respectively. GDS (or stream format) was first created in the late 1970s to support the first generation of custom IC layout tools, such as Calma’s GDSII system. Of course, the GDS format has been updated… Read More
Physical verification is an important and necessary step in the process to tapeout an IC design, and the foundries define sign-off qualification steps for:
This sounds quite reasonable until you actually go through the steps only to discover that some of the … Read More
There is an emerging set of advanced packaging technologies that enables unique product designs, with the capability to integrate multiple die, from potentially heterogeneous technologies. These “system-in-package” (SiP) offerings provide architects with the opportunity to optimize product performance, power, cost,… Read More
Technology trends make the concerns with electronic noise a primary constraint that impacts many mainstream products, driving the need for “Design-for-Noise” practices. That is, scaling, and the associated reduction in the device operating voltage and current, in effect magnifies the relative importance of non-scalable… Read More
As feature sizes have shrunk, the semiconductor industry has moved from simple, single-exposure lithography solutions to increasingly complex resolution-enhancement techniques and multi-patterning. Where the design on a mask once matched the image that would be produced on the wafer, today the mask and resulting image … Read More
A few weeks back I wrote an article mentioning that Mentor Graphics has been quietly working on solutions for photonic integrated circuits (PICs) for some time now, while one of their competitors has recently established a photonics beachhead. One of the most common challenges for PIC designs is their curvilinear nature, thus… Read More
It is truly amazing to consider the advances in microelectronic process development, using 193i photolithography. The figure below is a stark reminder of the difference between the illuminating wavelength and the final imaged geometries. This technology evolution has been enabled by continued investment in mask data generation… Read More
This year is shaping up to be an inflection point, when multi-die packaging technology will experience tremendous market growth. Advanced 2.5D/3D package offerings have been available for several years, utilizing a variety of technologies to serve as the package substrate, interposer material for embedding die micro-bump… Read More
At the Samsung theatre (cutely named the Samsung Open Collaboration (SoC) theater) I watched a presentation by KK Lin on using DFM to bring up their 14nm and 10nm processes. And yes, they are real. Here is a picture I took of a 14nm wafer and a 10nm wafer. Samsung announced that they would ramp 10n to volume production by the end of next… Read More
In modern electronic industry PCBs are required to accommodate highly dense circuits with large number of components and complex routing spaces. While the complexity is increasing, the time-to-market is decreasing. In such a scenario, there is no other option than to reduce the design time by employing innovative editing options… Read More
