Productivity Keeping Pace With Complexity

By Brian Bailey - 24 Sep, 2020 - Comments: 0

Designs have become larger and more complex and yet design time has shortened, but team sizes remain essentially flat. Does this show that productivity is keeping pace with complexity for everyone? The answer appears to be yes, at least for now, for a multitude of reasons. More design and IP reuse is using more and larger IP blocks and subsystems. In addition, the tools are improving, and mo... » read more

Industry Pushes For Fab Tool Security Standards

By Mark LaPedus - 17 Sep, 2020 - Comments: 1

The semiconductor industry is developing new cybersecurity standards for fab equipment in an effort to protect systems from potential cyberattacks, viruses, and IP theft. Two new standards are in the works, which are being formulated under the auspices of the SEMI trade group with leadership from chipmakers and others. Led by Intel and Cimetrix, the first standard deals with malware-free equ... » read more

Understanding The Performance Of Processor IP Cores

By Roddy Urquhart - 27 Aug, 2020 - Comments: 1

Looking at any processor IP, you will find that their vendors emphasize PPA (performance, power & area) numbers. In theory, they should provide a level playing field for comparing different processor IP cores, but in reality, the situation is more complex. Let us consider performance. The first thing to think about is what aspect of performance you care about. Do you care more about the ... » read more

From Cloud To Cloudlets

By Ed Sperling - 17 Aug, 2020 - Comments: 0

Cloudlets, or mini-clouds, are starting to roll out closer to the sources of data in an effort to reduce latency and improve overall processing performance. But as this approach gains steam, it also is creating some new challenges involving data distribution, storage and security. The growing popularity of distributed clouds is a recognition that the cloud model has limitations. Sending the ... » read more

Startup Funding: July 2020

By Jesse Allen - 05 Aug, 2020 - Comments: 0

A number of semiconductor and design companies took in funding this month, from a mega round for a data center switch maker to seed grants for two Canadian companies and new funding for an IP marketplace. China continues to be a hot area for electric vehicles, with one company raising half a billion for its two models currently in production. For July, we highlight fifteen startups that raised ... » read more

CodaCache: Helping to Break the Memory Wall

By Arteris - 04 Aug, 2020 - Comments: 0

As artificial intelligence (AI) and autonomous vehicle systems have grown in complexity, system performance needs have begun to conflict with latency and power consumption requirements. This dilemma is forcing semiconductor engineers to re-architect their system-on-chip (SoC) designs to provide more scalable levels of performance, flexibility, efficiency, and integration. From the edge to data ... » read more

EDA Forms The Basis For Designing Secure Systems

By Adam Cron - 03 Aug, 2020 - Comments: 0

By Adam Cron and Brandon Wang As Internet of Things (IoT) devices rapidly increase in popularity and deployment, security risks are arising at all levels. It could be at the usability level such as social engineering, pretexting, phishing; at the primitive level such as cryptanalysis; at the software level such as client-side scripting, code injection; and now even at the hardware level. Dur... » read more

IP Integration Verification At DVClub Europe

By Saša Stamenković - 30 Jul, 2020 - Comments: 0

Most people involved in pre-silicon verification of digital designs and electronic design automation (EDA) know the folks at Test and Verification Solutions (T&VS – now acquired by Tessolve to offer a full VLSI and test service). Among other things, they organize the Verification Futures (VF) conference in the UK and the DVClub Europe meetings. These are highly technical events, with plen... » read more

Power Impact At The Physical Layer Causes Downstream Effects

By Ann Mutschler - 09 Jul, 2020 - Comments: 0

Data movement is rapidly emerging as one of the top design challenges, and it is being complicated by new chip architectures and physical effects caused by increasing density at advanced nodes and in multi-chip systems. Until the introduction of the latest revs of high-bandwidth memory, as well as GDDR6, memory was considered the next big bottleneck. But other compute bottlenecks have been e... » read more

An Automotive Value Chain In Flux

By Kurt Shuler - 01 Jul, 2020 - Comments: 0

When companies view suppliers from inside their specialized niches, it is tempting to imagine the business world will continue as-is, with just minimal improvements each year. But in the automotive value chain, this no longer holds. The rapid pace of innovation around intelligent systems in cars is disrupting the business flow. Back in simpler times, semiconductor companies would work with Tier... » read more

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Knowledge Centers
Entities, people and technologies explored

Shift Left Is The Tip Of The Iceberg

A transformative change is underway for semiconductor design and EDA. New languages, models, and abstractions will need to be created.

by Brian Bailey

Partitioning In The Chiplet Era

Understanding how chiplets interact under different workloads is critical to ensuring signal integrity and optimal performance in heterogeneous designs.

by Ann Mutschler

3.5D: The Great Compromise

Pros and cons of a middle-ground chiplet assembly that combines 2.5D and 3D-IC.

by Ed Sperling

AI’s Role In Chip Design Widens, Drawing In New Startups

Focus is on letting engineers do much more with the same or fewer resources — and less drudgery.

by Karen Heyman

Key Technologies To Extend EUV To 14 Angstroms

Alongside high-NA EUV will be better-performing photoresists, reduced roughness using passivation and etch, and lateral etching to reduce tip-to-tip dimensions.

by Laura Peters

What Comes After HBM For Chiplets

The standard for high-bandwidth memory limits design freedom at many levels, but that is required for interoperability. What freedoms can be taken from other functions to make chiplets possible?

by Brian Bailey

Memory Fundamentals For Engineers

eBook: Nearly everything you need to know about memory, including detailed explanations of the different types of memory; how and where these are used today; what's changing, which memories are successful and which ones might be in the future; and the limitations of each memory type.

by The SE Staff

Why Small Fab And Assembly Houses Are Thriving

Megafabs churning out the most advanced processors are not the only game in town.

by Bryon Moyer

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