IP Safe Enough To Use In Cars


IP that is used for functional safety needs to respond to events that can happen, whether those are planned or random. Jody Defazio, vice president of IP quality and functional safety at Synopsys, talks with Semiconductor Engineering about ASIL compliance, what the different levels mean, and the impact of using chips developed at the most advanced process nodes in automotive applications. » read more

Change Management With Impact Analysis During Safety-Critical IP And SoC Development


Standards like ISO 26262 provide guidance to mitigate safety risks by defining safety analyses requirements and processes. The standard describes Change Management as a way to analyze and control changes in safety-related work products, items, and elements throughout the safety lifecycle. Impact analysis, a part of the Change Management process, is a systematic approach for evaluating changes t... » read more

Week In Review: Design, Low Power


Xilinx acquired the assets of Falcon Computing Solutions, a provider of high-level synthesis (HLS) compiler optimization technology for hardware acceleration of software applications. The acquisition will be integrated into the Xilinx Vitis Unified Software Platform to automate hardware-aware optimizations of C++ applications with minimal hardware expertise. “Our compiler provides a high degr... » read more

Week In Review: Auto, Security, Pervasive Computing


Security The United States Department of Defense added China's SMIC to its blacklist for its alleged cooperation with the Chinese military, reports Reuters. U.S. investors are asked not to invest in SMIC, among 35 other companies based in China on the list. Intel Labs launched the Private AI Collaborative Research Institute with Avast and Borsetta, to advance and develop technologies in pri... » read more

Using ICs To Shrink Auto’s Carbon Footprint


A large portion of the burden for reducing greenhouse gases is being handed off to makers of automotive chips and systems, which are being tasked to make vehicles drive further using less energy and with zero emissions. The effort is critical in battling climate change. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the transportation sector represented 28.2% of 2018 greenhouse gas e... » read more

Effective Configuration Of Security Tools


To do a job well, you need the right tools. But it’s just as important—perhaps even more so—to use those tools correctly. A hammer will make things worse in your construction project if you’re trying to use it as a screwdriver or a drill. The same is true in software development. The intricacies of coding and the fact that it’s done by humans means that throughout the software deve... » read more

Blog Review: Dec. 2


Mentor's Harry Foster investigates the effectiveness of today’s FPGA verification processes in terms of nontrivial bug escapes into production as part of the 2020 Wilson Research Group Functional Verification Study. Synopsys' Chris Clark points to how integral sensors are to the modern vehicle and key design considerations for making them more effective, safe, and reliable. Cadence's Pa... » read more

Software Due Diligence: A Buyer’s Checklist And Guidelines


The potential risk and exposure posed by M&A transactions demand thorough and robust due diligence practices. When an acquisition involves software, it's critical to ensure that associated risks are identified and fully understood. Knowing what questions to ask when performing due diligence is key to avoiding potential risks and legal complications. This is especially true for the acquisiti... » read more

Silicon Lifecycle Management


How do you track, measure and ensure reliability over the lifetime of a chip, regardless of how or where it is used? Steve Pateras, senior director of marketing for test products at Synopsys, drills down into the impact of hardware-software co-design, over-the-air updates, the expected lifetime of designs, and how the various monitors and sensors are used to track environmental, structural and ... » read more

Forward And Backward Compatibility In IC Designs


Future-proofing of designs is becoming more difficult due to the accelerating pace of innovation in architectures, end markets, and technologies such as AI and machine learning. Traditional approaches for maintaining market share and analyzing what should be in the next rev of a product are falling by the wayside. They are being replaced by best-guesses about market trends and a need to bala... » read more

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