The Week In Review: Design

Tools
Sonics upgraded its on-chip network, improving support for memory subsystems as well as performance with guaranteed bandwidth allocation across multiple SOC flows. The company said these upgrades add support for the latest DDR4 and LPDDR4 memories, for the multi-threading capabilities of the Open Core Protocol interface, and while adding non-blocking concurrency technologies.

Mentor Graphics added a new PCB tool for data management for work-in-progress designs, increasing the visibility and usability of that data.

And Cadence added three new PCB products for collaboration among engineering teams, for combining component IP, and for improved PCB documentation.

Deals
Rambus’ Cryptography Research security division signed a patent licensing deal with Entropic to prevent differential power analysis attacks in Entropic’s set-top box SoCs. The deal builds on a previous agreement, under which Entropic licensed Rambus’ tamper resistant cores.

Renesas said it achieved a 3X reduction in chip-finishing turnaround time using Cadence’s signoff data analysis technology. Renesas said that after full-chip verification, opening the database for chip finishing can impact last-minute schedules.

Numbers
Cadence reported its fiscal Q2 numbers. Revenue was $379 million, up from $362 in the same period in 2013. On a GAAP basis, net income was $23 million, compared with $9 million in 2013. On a non-GAAP basis, revenue was $64 million, up from $61 million in the same period in 2013.

Rambus reported its Q2 financial results. Revenue was $76.5 million, up 32% year over year due to a one-time catch-up payment from a new license agreement signed with Nanya Technology in Q1. Net income was $5 million, compared with a net loss of $7.8 million in the same period in 2013. Non-GAAP net income was $18.9 million, up 273% from the same quarter in 2013.

NXP reported its Q2 results, as well. Revenue was $1.349 billion, up 14% year over year from the same period in 2013. Net income was $159 million, compared to $111 million a year ago. On a non-GAAP basis, net income increased to $273 million from $182 million in the same period in 2013.

Finally, the U.S. Dept. of Labor predicts there will be 1.4 million new information technology jobs by 2020, noting there may not be enough adequate training programs in the United States.