Dynamic in-chip current distribution simulation technology for power device layout design


Abstract: "This paper reports an in-chip current distribution verification technology for power devices that takes into account the effect of layout parasitics. The proposed method enables verification of dynamic current distribution in a chip considering the influence of layout parasitics from the initial stage of device development by brushing up each element technology of TCAD, Spice mode... » read more

Faster Analog Design Closure With Early Parasitic Analysis Flow – Part 1


In part 1 of this series, Denis Goinard, Director of Engineering at Synopsys, discusses how Synopsys provides a unified workflow to accurately estimate, measure, extract and simulate parasitics by bringing signoff tools into the design process, enabling faster design convergence. Click here to play the video. Note: This is a Synopsys 'video white paper.' For more video white papers, click h... » read more

3 Types Of AI Hardware


As AI chips become more pervasive, three primary approaches are moving to the forefront. Bradley Geden, director of product marketing at Synopsys, looks at how to take advantage of repeatability, what the different flavors look like, the difference between flat and hierarchical design, and what impact black-box arrays have on programmability. » read more

Post Layout Simulation Is Becoming The Bottleneck For Analog Verification


My, have times changed. I remember when I first started out as a green analog designer right out of college, we would cut rubylith masking film on a large light table representing the different layers of our design to generate the design for manufacturing of the chip. We proactively worked to mitigate cross coupling of noise to our signal nets, but we were rarely concerned about interconnect re... » read more

Low-Power Analog


Analog circuitry is usually a small part of a large SoC, but it does not scale in the same way as digital circuitry under Moore's Law. The power consumed by analog is becoming an increasing concern, especially for battery-operated devices. At the same time, little automation is available to help analog designers reduce consumption. "Newer consumer devices, like smartphones and wearables, alo... » read more

Earlier Is Better In Latch-Up Detection


Physical verification is an essential step in integrated circuit (IC) design verification. Foundries provide design rule manuals that specify the precise physical requirements needed to ensure the design can be correctly manufactured, and the verification team runs the layout through checks based on those rules to ensure compliance. However, ensuring that a design can be manufactured does not g... » read more

Interconnect Inductance Extraction For Analog And RF IC Designs


Increasing operating frequencies for analog/RF designs mean interconnect inductance parasitic extraction is now required to ensure accurate circuit performance and high reliability. Automated field solver-based inductance extraction of both self and mutual parasitics enables IC companies to deliver analog/RF chips that provide the intended level of performance and reliability. To read more, ... » read more

Analog Simulation At 7/5/3nm


Hany Elhak, group director of product management at Cadence, talks with Semiconductor Engineering about analog circuit simulation at advanced nodes, why process variation is an increasing problem, the impact of parasitics and finFET stacking, and what happens when gate-all-around FETs are added into the chip. » read more

How FinFET Device Performance Is Affected By Epitaxial Process Variations


By Shih-Hao (Jacky) Huang and Yu De Chen As the need to scale transistors to ever-smaller sizes continues to press on technology designers, the impact of parasitic resistance and capacitance can approach or even outpace other aspects of transistor performance, such as fringing capacitance or source drain resistance. The total resistance in a device is comprised of two components: internal re... » read more

DC Bus Switching Performance as Determined by Commutation Loop Parasitics and Switching Dynamics


In this article a 250 kW all-SiC inverter evaluation kit designed around low-inductance, high-speed power modules is used to demonstrate the DC bus switching performance resulting from the interaction among commutation loop parasitics and the switching dynamics. The interplay among the DC bus structure parasitics and near-RF switching dynamics can be quantified in both the time and frequency do... » read more

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