How To Speed Up LVS Verification


Layout versus schematic (LVS) comparison is a crucial step in integrated circuit (IC) design verification, ensuring that the physical layout of the circuit matches its schematic representation. The primary goal of LVS is to verify the correctness and functionality of the design. Traditionally, LVS comparison is performed during signoff verification, where dedicated tools compare layout and sche... » read more

Managing Reflections With Terminations


Have you heard recommendations to use a particular termination in particular situations for good signal integrity? Have you ever wondered how to incorporate terminations in your design? While there are typical use cases for various terminations, sometimes engineers use termination techniques based on a recommendation or assumption that may not work, or at least may not be optimal, for their par... » read more

Accelerating Reset Domain Crossing Verification With Data Analytics Techniques


By Reetika and Sulabh Kumar Khare As the complexity of integrated circuit (IC) designs continues to rise, the task of verifying these designs has become increasingly challenging. The pace of this growth is staggering, with design complexity doubling roughly every 20 months. This exponential increase places immense pressure on verification processes, which must keep up to ensure that these so... » read more

Design Optimal ESD Protection With Context-Aware SPICE Simulation


Electrostatic discharge (ESD) is a major reliability concern for modern ICs. Ensuring the robustness of ICs in an ESD event by providing adequate ESD protection is proving to be a major challenge for IC designers due to factors such as shrinking of the design features, reduction in gate oxide thickness, increase in the contact and interconnect resistance and an increase in the overall design co... » read more

Here At Last! Automated Verification Of Heterogeneous 2D/3D Package Connectivity


By Michael Walsh and Jin Hou with Todd Burkholder The heterogeneous integration of multiple ICs in a single package along with high-performance, high-bandwidth memory is critical for many high-performance computing applications. After everything has been heterogeneously integrated and packaged, such designs feature complex connectivity with many hundreds of thousands of connections, making i... » read more

Ensuring Your Power And Ground Nets Are Correctly Connected


In most chip designs, the power and ground nets are likely your largest and most important nets. If any devices are not properly connected, then you cannot expect them to function as expected. Amongst the many problems that can occur to power and ground involves the connections to the well areas of your design that power all the bulk connections to your devices. Well regions connectivity is oft... » read more

The 3D-IC Multiphysics Challenge Dictates A Shift-Left Strategy


As the industry marches forward in a 3D-IC centric design approach (figure 1), we are facing a new problem. Sometimes referred to as “electro-thermal” or “electro-thermo-mechanical,” it really is the confluence of multiple forms of physics exerting impacts on both the physical manufacture and structure of these multi-die designs and their electrical behavior. Fig. 1: Illustration... » read more

A New Strategy For Successful Block/Chip Design-Stage Verification


Achieving efficiency in integrated circuit (IC) design while maintaining design quality is not just a goal, but a necessity. Designers constantly strive to strike a balance between ever-tightening time-to-market constraints and the finite resources at their disposal, while ensuring the quality of their designs remains uncompromised. Traditionally, IC design flows have been depicted as a linear ... » read more

Maximizing Efficiency And Productivity: The Benefits Of Shift Left Verification For IP Designers


Intellectual property (IP) designers play a crucial role by creating reusable components that form the building blocks of larger integrated circuit (IC) designs. These components, whether developed in-house or acquired from specialized IP design companies, are essential for providing core functionality such as memory and standard libraries. However, designing and verifying IP is a complex and d... » read more

Five Digital Threads Unify And Simplify Electronic Systems Design And Manufacturing


By Matthew Walsh and Matt Bromley Digital transformation involves the integration of digital technologies and the reimagining of business processes to enhance operations, improve customer experiences, and drive innovation. Digital threads are a key component of this transformation, as they enable the seamless flow of data and information across various stages of a process, system, or organiz... » read more

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