Blog Review: Sept. 6


Mentor's Jeff Miller explains why hardware security is important for IoT edge devices, where vulnerabilities lie today, and how researchers created an undetectable backdoor attack circuit. Cadence's Meera Collier argues that while AI is getting good at many things, composing music is not yet one of them. Synopsys' Robert Vamosi considers the state of voting machine security as security re... » read more

The Week In Review: Design


M&A Silvaco finalized its acquisition of SoC Solutions. The Georgia-based company was founded in 2000. Its team and portfolio of pre-configured IP subsystems and IoT/M2M IP will join Silvaco's IP group. Terms were not disclosed. Siemens PLM will acquire TASS International, a provider of simulation software, engineering and test services aimed primarily at the automotive industry. Based ... » read more

Executive Insight: Wally Rhines


Wally Rhines, president and CEO of [getentity id="22017" e_name="Mentor, a Siemens Business"], sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to talk about industry consolidation, a shift in emphasis from chips to systems, and what the recent acquisition by Siemens will mean for Mentor. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: A year ago it looked as if the entire industry was going to b... » read more

Blog Review: Aug. 30


Cadence's Meera Collier explains machine learning, unsupervised algorithms, and why Facebook's recently publicized AI chatbot conversation isn't as inscrutable as it sounds. Synopsys' Robert Vamosi considers recently proposed legislation which seeks to mitigate the risk of botnets commandeering IoT devices used in the U.S. government, including limiting the use of hard-coded passwords and ce... » read more

Are You Designing The Right Product?


Development and production of SoCs is becoming more and more complex and expensive. And rightfully so, the semiconductor industry spends billions of dollars on verification efforts. Verification is about checking the design behaves per its specification, a process that is very important and well understood. Still, something can go terribly wrong because having a verified SoC does not guarant... » read more

One Belt, One Road


China's so-called One Belt, One Road policy on global trade could have significant repercussions on semiconductors and IP if it succeeds. It's hardly a slam-dunk, and China has been vying for a larger position in the semiconductor industry for some time. But this is a completely different strategy because China is not attempting to go it alone this time. China has been rather quietly build... » read more

Executive Insight: Aart de Geus


Aart de Geus, chairman and co-CEO of [getentity id="22035" e_name="Synopsys"], sat down with Semiconductor Engineering to discuss machine learning and big data, the race toward autonomous vehicles, systems vs. chips, software vs. hardware, and the future of EDA. What follows are excerpts of that conversation. SE: The whole tech world is buzzing over data and how it gets used in areas such as... » read more

When Is Verification Complete?


Deciding when verification is done is becoming a much more difficult decision, prompting verification teams to increasingly rely on metrics rather than just the tests listed in the verification plan. This trend has been underway for the past couple of process nodes, but it takes time to spot trends and determine whether they are real or just aberrations. The Wilson Research Group conducts a ... » read more

Fuzz Testing Maturity Model


Fuzz testing is a highly effective technique for locating vulnerabilities in software. Malformed and unexpected inputs are delivered to the target software, and when failures occur, vulnerabilities have been located. Fuzzing is a widely recognized technique for improving the security, robustness, and safety of software. However, fuzzing is an open-ended pursuit—an infinite space problem. So, ... » read more

Blog Review: Aug. 23


Cadence's Madhavi Rao asks whether India should have more fabs and the role government policy should play. Synopsys' Kapil Rajpal checks out the Serial Peripheral Interface, which is emerging as a popular choice in automotive applications, and various vendor specific flavors. In a video, Mentor's Colin Walls explains inter-task communication and the basic mechanisms of how to pass data fr... » read more

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