Actel Goes Public – The IPO

Actel Goes Public – The IPO
by John East on 09-23-2019 at 6:00 am
Categories: John East
8 Comments

In 1990 Xilinx notified us that they believed Actel was infringing a patent that had just been issued to them. My immediate thoughts – the patent system is all screwed up! Actel had been developing our product for five years. We had been shipping it for a year and a half. During all that time, we were totally unaware that there was … Read More

September 16, 2019October 3, 2019

More Actel Foundry Woes: Andy Grove and Intel

More Actel Foundry Woes: Andy Grove and Intel
by John East on 09-16-2019 at 6:00 am
Categories: Intel, John East
14 Comments

The foundry problem continued to plague us at Actel. We had a really complex process! But —- we needed state of the art feature sizes if we were to compete with Xilinx. TI and Matsushita had been doing a good job for us, but not in fabs with state of the art technology. We were two process generations behind! At two generations… Read More

September 2, 2019September 17, 2019

From AMD to Actel (to Microchip)

From AMD to Actel (to Microchip)
by John East on 09-02-2019 at 6:00 am
Categories: John East
2 Comments

By the late 80s it had become clear to me that the Japanese were right. Memories, Microprocessors, and Gate Arrays (As well as ASICs) were what customers wanted then. “Building blocks of ever-increasing complexity” was obsolete. What next? Should I try to become an overnight networking expert? Maybe a DSP expert? Pretty… Read More

August 8, 2019January 8, 2020

Tortuga Webinar: Ensuring System Level Security Through HW/SW Verification

Tortuga Webinar: Ensuring System Level Security Through HW/SW Verification
by Bernard Murphy on 08-08-2019 at 6:00 am
Categories: Cadence, Events, Security, Synopsys, Tortuga Logic, Xilinx

We all know (I hope) that security is important so we’re willing to invest time and money in this area but there are a couple of problems. First there’s no point in making your design secure if it’s not competitive and making it competitive is hard enough, so the great majority of resource and investment is going to go into that objective.… Read More

April 1, 2019November 22, 2019

FPGA Landscape Update 2019

FPGA Landscape Update 2019
by Daniel Nenni on 04-01-2019 at 7:00 am
Categories: Achronix, eFPGA, FPGA, Xilinx
8 Comments

In 2015 Intel acquired Altera for $16.7B changing one of the most heated rivalries (Xilinx vs Altera) the fabless semiconductor ecosystem has ever seen. Prior to the acquisition the FPGA market was fairly evenly split between Xilinx and Altera with Lattice and Actel playing to market niches in the shadows. There were also two FPGA… Read More

December 17, 2018

Intel Discontinues the Custom Foundry Business!

Intel Discontinues the Custom Foundry Business!
by Daniel Nenni on 12-17-2018 at 7:00 am
Categories: Foundries, Intel
6 Comments

After mentioning what I heard at IEDM 2018, that Intel was officially closing the merchant foundry business as an aside in a SemiWiki forum discussion, I got a lot of email responses so let me clarify. Honestly I did not think it was a big surprise. Intel Custom Foundry was an ill conceived idea (my opinion) from the very start and was… Read More

November 13, 2018

DAC 2019 to Host the Second System Design Contest!

DAC 2019 to Host the Second System Design Contest!
by Daniel Nenni on 11-13-2018 at 7:00 am
Categories: EDA, Events

Interested in showing off your talent in developing deep learning algorithms on embedded hardware platforms for solving real-world problems? Join the second System Design Contest (SDC) at the 56[SUP]th[/SUP] Design Automation Conference in 2019!… Read More

October 23, 2018

Webinar: ASIC and FPGA Functional Verification Study

Webinar: ASIC and FPGA Functional Verification Study
by Alex Tan on 10-23-2018 at 12:00 pm
Categories: EDA, FPGA, Intel, Mentor, a Siemens Business, Xilinx

ASIC or FPGA? Each design style has earned designers’ votes depending on the level of urgency, application complexity and funding of their assigned projects. While it is feasible to transition from ASIC to FPGA design or vice versa, such a move is usually done across project refresh instead of midcourse.

Both Xilinx and … Read More

October 11, 2018

One Less Reason to Delay that Venture

One Less Reason to Delay that Venture
by Bernard Murphy on 10-11-2018 at 7:00 am
Categories: ARM, FPGA, IP, Xilinx

Many of us dream about the wonderful widget we could build that would revolutionize our homes, parking, health, gaming, factories or whatever domain gets our creative juices surging, but how many of us take it the next step? Even when you’re ready to live on your savings, prototypes can be expensive and royalties add to the pain. … Read More

September 25, 2018

Cloud FPGA Optimal Design Closure, Synthesis, and Timing Using Plunify’s AI Strategies

Cloud FPGA Optimal Design Closure, Synthesis, and Timing Using Plunify’s AI Strategies
by Camille Kokozaki on 09-25-2018 at 12:00 pm
Categories: EDA, FPGA

Plunify, powered by machine learning and the cloud, delivers cloud-based solutions and optimization software to enable a better quality of results, higher productivity and better efficiency for design. Plunify is a software company in the Electronic Design Market with a focus on FPGA. It was founded in 2009, has its HQ in Singapore… Read More

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