Can EDA Keep Growing?


Slower progress at the leading edge of process technology, coupled with rising costs and fewer design starts, are changing the economics of the EDA world. Not surprisingly, there is almost a direct correlation between the shrinking number of startups in the field and the number of customers working on the most advanced nodes. So what exactly does this mean for the EDA world? Big changes, for... » read more

Where Do We Stand With CDC?


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss where the industry stands on clock domain crossing with Charlie Janac, CEO of Arteris; Shaker Sarwary, VP of Formal Verification Products at Atrenta; Pranav Ashar, CTO at Real Intent; and Namit Gupta, CAE, Verification Group at Synopsys. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: While not a new aspect of design, clock domain crossing is... » read more

Semiconductor R&D Crisis Ahead?


Listen to engineering management at chipmakers these days and a consistent theme emerges: They’re all petrified about where to place their next technology bets. Do they move to 14/16nm finFETs with plans to shrink to 10nm, 7nm and maybe even 5nm? Do they invest in 2.5D and 3D stacked die? Or do they eke more from existing process nodes using new process technologies, more compact designs and ... » read more

Without Moore’s Law: EDA


Semiconductor Engineering is examining the assertion about the end of Moore’s Law in a number of different ways. The special report, “Will 7nm and 5nm really happen?” looked at the technical aspects related to continuing into finer geometries. “Moore’s Law Tail No Longer Wagging the Dog” asked the question about the economics of people being able to afford to go to the latest node. ... » read more

New Uses For Emulation


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss the changing emulation landscape with Jim Kenney, director of marketing for emulation at Mentor Graphics; Tom Borgstrom, director of the verification group at Synopsys; Frank Schirrmeister, group director of product marketing for the System Development Suite at Cadence; Gary Smith, chief analyst at Gary Smith EDA; and Lauro Rizzatti, a verification ... » read more

Executive Insight: Aart de Geus


SE: What worries you most? De Geus: Everything I do is with high intensity, and what is of super high intensity right now—and there are challenges and opportunities in it—is that we have the confluence of some very big changes right now happening at the same time. On the technology side, there are multiple intersections. One is the intersection of another 10 years of Moore’s Law—finF... » read more

Elementary Not Too Early To Encourage Girls In Math And Science


Dr. Diana Marculescu, Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University is this year’s recipient of the Marie R. Pistilli Women in Electronic Design Automation (EDA) Achievement Award, which honors Dr. Marculescu for her leadership and for providing a role model to women in engineering through both her research and her teaching. Semiconductor Engineering spoke wit... » read more

Executive Insight: Charles Janac


SE: What’s your biggest concern? Janac: Staying current. One of the things that is really important is to understand shifts in the marketplace. In the past, we looked at whether to target our interconnect solution at digital TV or mobility. This was actually a very interesting question in 2005. The DTV market looked better, but we were not getting enough evaluations. We were doing better i... » read more

New Uses For Emulation


Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss the changing emulation landscape with Jim Kenney, director of marketing for emulation at Mentor Graphics; Tom Borgstrom, director of the verification group at Synopsys; Frank Schirrmeister, group director of product marketing for the System Development Suite at Cadence; Gary Smith, chief analyst at Gary Smith EDA; and Lauro Rizzatti, a verification ... » read more

Executive Insight: Grant Pierce


SE: What worries you most? Pierce: At the very top of my list is continuing to attract the talent into the company that we’ve managed to build up over time. Inside of Sonics, it’s a unique situation. We’re at the boundary between system-level architecture and chip-level micro-architecture for having what the system guys are looking for in the silicon. We need expertise in any IP that t... » read more

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