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Partitioning Drives Architectural Considerations


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to explore partitioning with Raymond Nijssen, vice president of system engineering at Achronix; Andy Ladd, CEO at Baum; Dave Kelf, chief marketing officer at Breker; Rod Metcalfe, product management group director in the Digital & Signoff Group at Cadence; Mark Olen, product marketing group manager at Mentor, a Siemens Business; Tom Anderson, technical mar... » read more

Using AI Data For Security


Artificial intelligence is migrating from the cloud to IoT edge devices. Now the question is how to apply that same technology to protect data and identify abnormal activity in those devices and the systems connected to them. This is a complex problem because AI is being used on multiple fronts in this battle, as well as for multiple purposes. The technology has advanced to the point where e... » read more

Adapting Mobile To A Post-Moore’s Law Era


The slowdown in Moore's Law is having a big impact on chips designed for the mobile market, where battery-powered devices need to still improve performance with lower power. This hasn't slowed down performance or power improvements, but it has forced chipmakers and systems companies to approach designs differently. And while feature shrinks will continue for the foreseeable future, they are ... » read more

Using Memory Differently


Chip architects are beginning to rewrite the rules on how to choose, configure and use different types of memory, particularly for chips with AI and some advanced SoCs. Chipmakers now have a number of options and tradeoffs to consider when choosing memories, based on factors such as the application and the characteristics of the memory workload, because different memory types work better tha... » read more

Power Issues Rising For New Applications


Managing power in chips is becoming more difficult across a wide range of applications and process nodes, forcing chipmakers and systems companies to rethink their power strategies and address problems much earlier than in the past. While power has long been a major focus in the mobile space, power-related issues now are spreading well beyond phones and laptop computers. There are several re... » read more

Process Variation And Aging


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss design reliability and circuit aging with João Geada, chief technologist for the semiconductor business unit at ANSYS; Hany Elhak, product management director, simulation and characterization in the custom IC and PCB group at Cadence; Christoph Sohrmann, advanced physical verification at Fraunhofer EAS; and Naseer Khan, vice president of sales at M... » read more

IoT Device Security Makes Slow Progress


Semiconductor Engineering sat down with Chris Jones, vice president of marketing at Codasip; Martin Croome, vice president of business development at GreenWaves Technologies; Kevin McDermott, vice president of marketing at Imperas; Scot Morrison, general manager, embedded platform technology at Mentor, a Siemens Business; Lauri Koskinen, CTO at Minima; and Mike Borza, principal security technol... » read more

Using Software Approaches In Hardware Verification


Agile methodologies, created to improve quality in software code, increasingly are being applied to hardware verification. This is less of a drastic shift than it might first appear. Developing a verification testbench is largely software, and similar methodologies can be used for reducing bugs in hardware. “A testbench is nothing more than a big software project, and it makes perfect s... » read more

Debug Tops Verification Tasks


Verification engineers are spending an increased percentage of their time in debug — 44%, according to a recent survey by the Wilson Research Group. There are a variety or reasons for this, including the fact that some SoCs are composed of hundreds of internally developed and externally purchased IP blocks and subsystems. New system architectures contribute to the mix, some of which are be... » read more

More Than A Core


Gajinder Pandesar, CTO of UltraSoC, talks with Semiconductor Engineering about why heterogeneous design is changing the starting point for chip design, and why integration is now the real challenge rather than the processor core. https://youtu.be/y0rzopp5HDI » read more

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