Three Tools Help Put Safe Vehicles On The Road


By Richard Pugh and Gabriele Pulini As the ultimate systems-of-systems, automated vehicles present an enormous verification task, requiring verification of complex sensing, computing, and actuating functions. This can be accomplished only by virtualizing the entire system: the vehicle and the environment it moves through. It also requires a combination of realistic scenario modeling, hard... » read more

April’19 Startup Funding: Corporate Gushers


It was another rich month for startups, large and small. In April’s top 11 funding rounds, five were investments by big corporations or corporate venture capital funds—an investor consortium led by the SoftBank Vision Fund, PayPal, Ford Motor, NTT DoCoMo, and HAPSMobile, a joint venture of SoftBank Group and AeroVironment. Those 11 investments totaled $3.74 billion. Intel Capital was als... » read more

Uhnder: Digital Radar Chips


Radar used to be slow, clunky, and expensive. That's changing quickly as tech companies begin bringing single-chip or single-package solutions to market, setting the stage for a price/performance battle in markets ranging from automotive to robotics. Uhnder, an Austin, Texas-based startup, is the first to roll out a single-chip radar solution that it claims is roughly 100X less expensive tha... » read more

Automotive, AI Drive Big Changes In Test


Design for test is becoming enormously more challenging at advanced nodes and in increasingly heterogeneous designs, where there may be dozens of different processing elements and memories. Historically, test was considered a necessary but rather mundane task. Much has changed over the past year or so. As systemic complexity rises, and as the role of ICs in safety-critical markets continues ... » read more

All Security Issues Are Safety Issues


Last month I spoke at the IQPC Safety and Security week event in Munich. It became clear to me that our semiconductor community is really paying attention to these issues now, not just to comply with standards, and not just because of the potential liability – but because it simply makes good business sense. The cost of recalling a single vehicle is estimated to be between $400 and $900 ... » read more

Automotive Functional Safety Using LBIST and Other Detection Methods


Functional safety requirements for safety-critical applications are addressed with the insertion of safety mechanisms to detect and/or correct potential failures: their effectiveness is measured by diagnostic coverage (DC). Built-in-self-test, or BIST, originally developed for manufacturing test, can be used as a detection mechanism for functional safety. However, it requires original values to... » read more

Controlling IC Manufacturing Processes For Yield


Equipment and tools vendors are starting to focus on data as a means of improving yield, adding more sensors and analysis capabilities into the manufacturing flow to circumvent problems in real time. How much this will impact the cost of developing complex chips at leading-edge nodes, and in 2.5D and 3D-IC packages, remains to be seen. But the race to both generate data during manufacturing ... » read more

Safety-Critical Coverage


Dave Landoll, solutions architect at OneSpin Solutions, discusses verification in safety-critical designs, why it’s more of a challenge in automotive than in avionics, and why verification of these systems includes what the system should not be doing as well as what it should be doing. https://youtu.be/Ze3WwEARfx0 » read more

Electric Cars Gain Traction, But Challenges Remain


Battery-powered electric vehicles are expected to reach a milestone in terms of shipments in 2019, but the technology faces several significant hurdles to gain wider adoption in the market. Limited driving range, high costs, battery issues, and a spotty charging infrastructure are the main challenges for battery electric vehicles (BEVs). In addition, there are issues with various power semic... » read more

Week in Review: IoT, Security, Auto


Internet of Things Smart-building technology is a factor in marketing new facilities to prospective tenants. The new Cambridge Crossing development in Cambridge, Mass., aspires to attract tech-oriented tenants much like nearby Kendall Square, this analysis notes. Philips has agreed to lease seven floors in Cambridge Crossing’s first office building, making that location its North American he... » read more

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