IP-XACT Is Back, For All The Right Reasons


The intent behind IP-XACT has always been to provide a bridge between system-on-chip (SoC) assembly and larger considerations. This standard has additionally been used to adapt to multi-sourced and constantly evolving intellectual property (IP) that design and product teams build, often in different companies. Moreover, it was used to interface with product development beyond the specialized ne... » read more

Integrating Embedded FPGA Made Easy


Chip designers have been integrating hard and soft IPs for decades – some being easy to integrate and others much more difficult. But what about eFPGA? It’s a relatively new IP on the IP landscape and according to data from Gartner, the market share of semiconductors with eFPGA is expected to approach $10B in 2023 with greater than 50% compounded annual growth. So, this raises the question ... » read more

A Price To Be Paid


Ancient wisdom says you should be careful what you ask for, because you just might get it. This was certainly true many times during my career within EDA, and I am sure it is still happening today. Sometimes the outcome was not what was wanted, or the price was higher than expected. As an example, consider VHDL, the language that was meant to correct the problems of Verilog. One of the probl... » read more

One-On-One: Lip-Bu Tan


Lip-Bu Tan, CEO of Cadence, sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to talk about the impact of massive increases in data across a variety of industries, the growing need for computational software, and the potential implications of U.S.-China relations. What follows are excerpts of that discussion. SE: What do you see as the biggest change for the chip industry? Tan: We're in our fifth g... » read more

Maximize The Value Of Your 3rd Party IP Investment


The need to get to market sooner has resulted in significant growth in the use of 3rd party IP. This in turn has led to a growth in IP vendors. While licensing 3rd party IP may lead to reducing the development effort and time, it can potentially be costly and bring upon significant risk. Of course, there is the obvious cost of licensing the IP itself, but there are several other hidden costs... » read more

RISC-V Targets Data Centers


RISC-V vendors are beginning to aim much higher in the compute hierarchy, targeting data centers and supercomputers rather than just simple embedded applications on the edge. In the past, this would have been nearly impossible for a new instruction set architecture. But a growing focus on heterogeneous chip integration, combined with the reduced benefits of scaling and increasing demand for ... » read more

What You Should Consider When Choosing A Processor IP Core


Most integrated circuits include at least one processor core and some embedded software. In the case of more complex systems-on-chip (SoC), there may be application processors running the main software, and operating system plus multiple specialised subsystems handling functions such as communications, security, and sensors. Requirements for processing vary considerably and there is a wide choi... » read more

EDA, IP Revenues Soar


EDA and IP revenues increased 15.4% to $3.032 billion in Q4 2020, according to a just-released report, with huge increases reported in China and India, and a solid double-digit increase in the Americas. EDA/IP revenue from China increased 66.4% in Q4 EDA/IP compared with the same period in 2019, and for the 2020 calendar year it was up 52.3%. India's spending was up 32% for the quarter. And ... » read more

Challenges Of Using The Cloud For IC Design


The ‘cloud’ is so ubiquitous that perhaps even your grandmother has heard about it. There are advertisements on TV with various vendors touting their cloud offerings. The cloud is ideal for eCommerce and SaaS (Software as a Service) offerings, as the elasticity on demand provides a convenient way to scale up when demand is high and scale down when it is low. Yet the design community has ... » read more

Distributed Development Of IP And SoC In Compliance With Automotive ISO 26262


Automotive functional safety System-on-Chips (SoCs) for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) contain several complex Intellectual Property (IP) cores. The IP cores are developed as a Safety Element out of Context (SEooC), meaning the context of the end application is not fully known at delivery time. In addition, IP development might be distributed across the globe. To reduce the risk of f... » read more

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