HW and SW Architecture Approaches For Running AI Models


How best to run AI inference models is a current topic of much debate as a wide breadth of systems companies look to add AI to a variety of systems, spurring both hardware innovation and the need to revamp models. Hardware developers are making progress with AI accelerators and SoCs. But on the model side, questions abound about whether the answer might come from revisiting older, less compl... » read more

RISC-V Conformance


Experts At The Table: Despite growing excitement and participation in the development of the RISC-V ecosystem, significant holes remain in the development flow. One of the most concerning is conformance, which must exist before software portability becomes possible. Semiconductor Engineering discussed the issue with John Min, vice president of customer service at Arteris; Zdeněk Přikryl, CTO... » read more

Blog Review: Oct. 30


Synopsys' Frank Schirrmeister argues that hardware-assisted verification techniques like emulation and prototyping are essential to help engineers improve design behavior to manage complexity and ensure systems function seamlessly in real-world applications. Siemens’ Stephen V. Chavez finds that ultra high-density interconnect (UHDI) has changed the design and production of PCBs to enable ... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


Europe's top court ruled in Intel's favor, voiding a $1.1 billion fine imposed by the European Union and dismissing charges of anti-competitive behavior. IBM released yield benchmarks for high-NA EUV, which serve as proof points that the newest advanced litho equipment will enable scaling beyond the 2nm process node. Also on the lithography front, Nikon is developing a maskless digital litho... » read more

New Approaches To Power Decoupling


Decoupling capacitors have long been an important aspect of maintaining a clean power source for integrated circuits, but with noise caused by rising clock frequencies, multiple power domains, and various types of advanced packaging, new approaches are needed. Power is a much more important factor than it used to be, especially in the era of AI. “Doing an AI search consumes 10X the power t... » read more

Blog Review: Oct. 23


Cadence’s Sanjeet Kumar introduces the message bus interface in the PHY Interface for the PCIe, SATA, USB, DisplayPort, and USB4 Architectures (PIPE) specification, which provides a way to initiate and participate in non-latency-sensitive PIPE operations using a small number of wires. Siemens’ Dennis Brophy argues that the recently published Portable Test and Stimulus Standard (PSS) 3.0 ... » read more

LLMs Show Promise In Secure IC Design


The introduction of large language models into the EDA flow could significantly reduce the time, effort, and cost of designing secure chips and systems, but they also could open the door to more sophisticated attacks. It's still early days for the use of LLMs in chip and system design. The technology is just beginning to be implemented, and there are numerous technical challenges that must b... » read more

Chip Industry Week In Review


Arm joined forces with Korea's Samsung Foundry, ADTechnology, and Rebellions to create a CPU chiplet platform for AI training and inference. The new chiplet will be based on Samsung's 2nm gate-all-around technology. Intel and AMD, arch competitors for decades, formed an x86 ecosystem advisory group to collaborate on architectural interoperability and simplify software development. Samsung... » read more

Boost High-Performance IC Design Flows With Early Interactive Symmetry Checking


In the realm of high-performance IC (integrated circuit) design, symmetry is not just an aesthetic preference—it’s a critical factor for ensuring proper device functionality, especially in analog and RF designs. Achieving symmetry early in the design process helps to ensure consistent electrical behavior, which is essential for meeting performance goals and maintaining device reliability. H... » read more

How Big A Deal Is Aging?


Nothing lasts forever, but in the semiconductor world things used to last long enough to become obsolete long before their end of life. That's no longer the case with newer nodes, and it is raising concerns in safety-critical markets such as automotive. Being able to fully understand what happens inside of chips is still a work in progress, and analysis approaches are trying to keep up. Unti... » read more

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