Virtual Platforms plus FPGA Prototyping, the Perfect Mix

Virtual Platforms plus FPGA Prototyping, the Perfect Mix
by Paul McLellan on 06-03-2012 at 8:59 pm

There are two main approaches to building a substructure on which to do software development and architectural analysis before a chip is ready: virtual platforms and FPGA prototyping.

Virtual platforms have the advantage that they are fairly quick to produce and can be created a long time before RTL design for the various blocks… Read More


Understanding and Designing For Variation in GLOBALFOUNDRIES 28nm

Understanding and Designing For Variation in GLOBALFOUNDRIES 28nm
by Daniel Nenni on 06-03-2012 at 8:30 pm

On Wednesday there is a User Track Poster Session that examines the design impact of process variation in GLOBALFOUNDRIES 28nm technology. For those of you who are wondering what process variation looks like at 20nm take this 28nm example and multiply it by one hundred (slight exaggeration, maybe).

Variation effects have a significant… Read More


Spyglass by Atrenta

Spyglass by Atrenta
by Paul McLellan on 06-03-2012 at 4:27 pm

I’ve been helping get booths set up at DAC in Moscone for the last couple of days. Atrenta’s booth shows their new branding that I talked about last week. Now you can see what they are doing in this picture of their booth. As I sort of guessed they are leading with the Spyglass name. The booth says everywhere “Spyglass… Read More


EDAC emerging companies, Hogan evening

EDAC emerging companies, Hogan evening
by Paul McLellan on 06-01-2012 at 12:14 am


This evening at Silicon Valley Bank was the first of what is planned to be a series about EDA startups. Apparently the seed of the idea was planted by Dan Nenni with Jim Hogan and Steve Pollock and the EDAC Emerging Companies committee ran with it.… Read More


Mentor Graphics Update 2012!

Mentor Graphics Update 2012!
by Daniel Nenni on 05-30-2012 at 3:30 pm

What is new with Mentor? Quite a bit actually. About this time last year Corporate Raider Carl Icahn stirred things up with a hostile takeover attempt that ended with three Raiderettes on the Mentor Board, out of eight board members total. This year however, two of the three Raiderettes are out so it looks like Mentor is firmly in control.… Read More


SpyGlass…the Mystery

SpyGlass…the Mystery
by Paul McLellan on 05-30-2012 at 1:30 am

Atrenta have put out a mysterious press release, a sort of teaser for what they are up to at DAC.

The first part is that they have an interview program at their booth (#2230) on the show floor where customers, partners and investors will talk about SpyGlass. Current speakers are:

  • Jack Browne (Sonics)
  • Jim Hogan (private investor)
  • Charlie
Read More

Oasys at DAC: Right Here, Right Now

Oasys at DAC: Right Here, Right Now
by Paul McLellan on 05-29-2012 at 9:01 pm

What is Oasys up to this year? For the last three years they have only had videos outside of their demo suite. The first year was a rock video, featuring Joe Costello (chairman off the board) and the executive management. The second year was parodies of the Mac vs PC ads with no prizes for guessing which one Oasys was. And last year was … Read More


Jasper at DAC: ARM, Broadcom, Nvidia, ST

Jasper at DAC: ARM, Broadcom, Nvidia, ST
by Paul McLellan on 05-28-2012 at 7:01 pm

At DAC (next week, in case you have been under a rock for the last few months) Jasper has four of their customers presenting. Of course they are also presenting themselves making a total of 5 seminars.

nVidia is presenting on Sequential Equivalency Checking for Power Optimization with JasperGold Apps. It is on Monday at 11am, Tuesday… Read More


Partitioning Pavilion Panel

Partitioning Pavilion Panel
by Paul McLellan on 05-28-2012 at 6:27 pm

I don’t think it can be a surprise to anyone reading this that designs have been getting larger. Someone called Moore said something about it decades ago, or so I heard. Designs are so large that they need to be partitioned into smaller parts. The two main motivations for this are that some design tools, especially place &… Read More


SpringSoft Update 2012!

SpringSoft Update 2012!
by Daniel Nenni on 05-28-2012 at 6:05 pm

Little known fact, SpringSoft, Inc. is the largest supplier of EDA software in Asia with headquarters in both Hsinchu, Taiwan, and in Silicon Valley, CA. You will be hard pressed to find a company that does not use SpringSoft products and being located right down the street from the top two foundries doesn’t hurt either.
Read More