Power/Performance Bits: Nov. 5

By Brian Bailey - 05 Nov, 2013 - Comments: 0

Even the world's best supercomputers are staggeringly inefficient and energy-intensive machines. Our brains have upwards of 86 billion neurons, connected by synapses that not only complete myriad logic circuits, but continuously adapt to stimuli, strengthening some connections while weakening others. We call that process learning, and it enables the kind of rapid, highly efficient computational... » read more

A Nobel Prize For Modeling And Simulation

By Brian Bailey - 24 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

This year, a Nobel Prize has been awarded for devising a computer model and simulation process. Bloomberg, which interviewed Marinda Wu by phone, said: “The models let us slow down…and let us look at them one piece at a time.” This enables them to optimize things. At this point you may be thinking one of three things. Either 1) I don’t remember that prize being awarded or, 2) at last ED... » read more

Will History Repeat Itself?

By Brian Bailey - 24 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

Hands up — how many people read the books by Clayton Christensen, books such as The Innovator’s Dilemma? His books were talked about endlessly in the corridors of the EDA companies when they first came out. They all wanted to identify the next disruption and could find reasons why almost every new tool was going to be disruptive. For people not familiar with his work, his main premise wa... » read more

Time To Rethink Verification

By Brian Bailey - 24 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

Verification traditionally has followed the path of the design team. When they change their methodology or tooling, verification engineers follow and attempts to incorporate it into their flow. The few times in the past when verification has attempted to lead, it has not ended well. An example of this was the attempt to get design teams using assertions. Assertions are proven to be valuable ... » read more

Power Is A Global Issue

By Brian Bailey - 10 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

Power is now the No. 1 target in developing chips. In a keynote speech at the recent Cadence Verification Summit, James “Jim” Hogan—an EDA investor associated with companies such as Sonics, Nimbic, Solido, AutoESL, Altos and many others, and previously part of Cadence’s Telos venture arm—made the point that power is the big problem that needs to be solved. We all know that reducing... » read more

Why does EUV matter?

By Brian Bailey - 01 Oct, 2013 - Comments: 0

By Brian Bailey The end of Moore’s Law has been predicted for almost as long as the law has existed. It normally comes down to some great technological barrier that cannot be breached, only to find that a solution is just around the corner and the concerns fade until the next barrier is identified. At DAC this year (2013), there were many predictions about why Moore’s Law will end in th... » read more

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