Soft checks are needed during Electrical Rule Checking of IC layouts

Soft checks are needed during Electrical Rule Checking of IC layouts
by Daniel Payne on 02-28-2024 at 10:00 am

Metal1 Via Metal2 s

IC designs have physical verification applications like Layout Versus Schematic (LVS) at the transistor-level to ensure that layout and schematics are equivalent, in addition there’s an Electrical Rules Check (ERC) for connections to well regions called a soft check. The  connections to all the devices needs to have the most… Read More


Successful 3DIC design requires an integrated approach

Successful 3DIC design requires an integrated approach
by Kalar Rajendiran on 11-13-2023 at 6:00 am

Siemens EDA 3DIC Graphics

While the leap from traditional SoC/IC designs to Three-Dimensional Integrated Circuits (3DICs) designs brings new benefits and opportunities, it also introduces new challenges. The benefits include performance, power efficiency, footprint reduction and cost savings. The challenges span design, verification, thermal… Read More


Ensuring 3D IC Semiconductor Reliability: Challenges and Solutions for Successful Integration

Ensuring 3D IC Semiconductor Reliability: Challenges and Solutions for Successful Integration
by Kalar Rajendiran on 10-25-2023 at 10:00 am

3D IC Cross Section Illustration

One of the most promising advancements in the semiconductor field is the development of 3D Integrated Circuits (3D ICs). 3D ICs enable companies to partition semiconductor designs and seamlessly integrate silicon Intellectual Property (IP) at the most suitable process nodes and processes. This strategic partitioning yields… Read More


3D IC – Managing the System-level Netlist

3D IC – Managing the System-level Netlist
by Daniel Payne on 09-27-2022 at 10:00 am

2.5D IC min

I just did a Google search for “3D IC”, and was stunned to see it return a whopping 476,000 results. This topic is trending, because more companies are using advanced IC packaging to meet their requirements, and yet the engineers doing the 3D IC design have new challenges to overcome. One of those challenges is creating… Read More


Unlock first-time-right complex photonic integrated circuits

Unlock first-time-right complex photonic integrated circuits
by Raha Vafaei on 06-01-2022 at 10:00 am

EPDA overview

The capacity and energy efficiency challenges from the growing appetite for high-speed data along with advanced applications such as LIDAR and quantum computing are driving demand for increasingly large-scale photonic integrated circuits (PIC). With an ever-increasing number of components on a single photonic chip, manual… Read More


EDA in the Cloud – Now More Than Ever

EDA in the Cloud – Now More Than Ever
by Kalar Rajendiran on 07-27-2021 at 10:00 am

Screen Shot 2021 07 14 at 4.32.16 PM

A decade ago, many of us heard commentaries on how entrepreneurs were turned down by venture capitalists for not including a cloud strategy in their business plan, no matter what the core business was. Humorous punchlines such as, “It’s cloudy without any clouds” and “Add some cloud to your strategy and your future will be bright… Read More


Analysis of Curvilinear FPDs

Analysis of Curvilinear FPDs
by Daniel Payne on 12-31-2020 at 6:00 am

FPD voltage distribution analysis min

This area of automating the design of Flat Panel Displays (FPD) is so broad that it has taken me three blogs to cover all of the details, so in brief review the first two blogs were:

My final blog covers five areas:

  • DRC/LVS for curvilinear layout
  • Circuit
Read More

Mentor unpacks LVS and LVL issues around advanced packaging

Mentor unpacks LVS and LVL issues around advanced packaging
by Tom Simon on 11-26-2019 at 6:00 am

Innovations in packaging have played an important role in improving system performance and area utilization. Advances like 2.5D interposers and fan-out wafer-level packaging (FOWLP) have allowed mixed dies to be used in a single package and have dramatically reduced the number of connections that need to go all the way to the… Read More


Robust Reliability Verification – A Critical Addition To Baseline Checks

Robust Reliability Verification – A Critical Addition To Baseline Checks
by Alex Tan on 03-01-2018 at 12:00 pm

Design process retargeting is acommon recurrence based on scaling orBOM(Bill-Of-Material) cost improvement needs. This occursnot only with the availability of foundry process refresh to a more advanced node,but also to any new derivative process node tailored towards matching design complexity, power profile or reliabilityRead More


Is there anything in VLSI layout other than “pushing polygons”? (5)

Is there anything in VLSI layout other than “pushing polygons”? (5)
by Dan Clein on 01-11-2018 at 12:00 pm

Being new in Ottawa and trying to get some momentum towards automation in full custom layout I was telling industry people that I am interested to work with everybody to move this agenda forward. My Director of Engineering at that time, Peter Gillingham, took me to visit Carleton University in Ottawa. One of his professor friends,… Read More