Doing what others don’t do

Doing what others don’t do
by Paul McLellan on 04-12-2012 at 2:56 pm

Wally Rhines’ keynote at U2U, the Mentor users’ group meeting, was about Mentor’s strategy of focusing on what other people don’t do. This is partially a defensive approach, since Mentor has never had the financial firepower to have the luxury of focusing all their development on sustaining their products and then make … Read More


Think differentiation

Think differentiation
by Paul McLellan on 10-27-2011 at 5:01 pm

Wally Rhines’s keynote at the ARM TechCon was about differentiation and how to use it to create measurable value. We all know what differentiation means in some intuitive sense, but how do you make it measurable? Wally’s answer was that differentiation is a measure of the difficulty of switching suppliers and is best… Read More


ARM TechCon 2011 Trip Report and Sailing Semiconductors!

ARM TechCon 2011 Trip Report and Sailing Semiconductors!
by Daniel Nenni on 10-26-2011 at 9:37 pm

This was my first ARM TechCon, they cordially invited me as media, but it certainly was not what I expected. Making matters worse, I had literally just flown in from a very long weekend sailing in Mexico which was much more interesting and certainly made me much less tolerant of sales and marketing nonsense. My Uncle Jim lives on a sailboat… Read More


TSMC 2011 Open Innovation Platform Ecosystem Forum Trip Report

TSMC 2011 Open Innovation Platform Ecosystem Forum Trip Report
by Daniel Nenni on 10-23-2011 at 3:00 pm

The TSMC OIP conference was Monday and Tuesday of last week. You have probably NOT read about it since it was invitation only and press was not invited. Slides were not made available (except for Mentor), no photos or video were allowed, it was a very private affair. Given that, I won’t be able to go into great detail but I will give you… Read More


Mentor Graphics 1 : Carl Icahn 0!

Mentor Graphics 1 : Carl Icahn 0!
by Daniel Nenni on 03-04-2011 at 10:03 pm

This is just another blog about Carl Icahn and his quest to conquer EDA, when in fact EDA is conquering him. It includes highlights from my dinner with Mentor Graphics and Physicist Brian Greene, the Mentor Q4 conference call, and meeting Mentor CEO Wally Rhines at DvCon 2011.

It wasn’t just the free food this time, dinner with BrianRead More


Wally Rhines DvCon 2011 Ketnote: From Volume to Velocity

Wally Rhines DvCon 2011 Ketnote: From Volume to Velocity
by Daniel Nenni on 02-23-2011 at 1:49 pm

Abstract:
There has been a remarkable acceleration in the adoption of advanced verification methodologies, languages and new standards. This is true across all types of IC design and geographic regions. Designers and verification engineers are surprisingly open to new approaches to keep pace with the relentless rise in design… Read More


Mentor Graphics Should Be Acquired or Sold: Carl Icahn

Mentor Graphics Should Be Acquired or Sold: Carl Icahn
by Daniel Nenni on 02-12-2011 at 5:42 pm

The big EDA news last week of course was the CNBC interview (HERE) with infamous corporate raider Carl Icahn. Carl is not happy with Mentor Executives, nor is Mentor investor Donald Drapkin who said, and I quote, “It’s just a sleepy company run like a country club”. Carl and Donald’s combined MENT investment is 20%+ … Read More