Top 5 Reasons Engineers Need A Smart NoC

As system-on-chip (SoC) designs grow more complex, IP interconnect engineers struggle with achieving optimal scalability, performance, and power efficiency. The increasing number of IP blocks, often ranging from 50 to more than 500, introduces significant interconnect congestion, timing closure issues, and power dissipation challenges. Additionally, many network-on-chip (NoC) design tasks are still performed manually, but increasing complexity has made this approach unsustainable. Today’s engineers face tight design schedules and rapid iteration cycles in order to meet aggressive time-to-market demands​.

To effectively tackle these challenges, designers need to consider an advanced NoC that goes beyond traditional interconnect solutions. FlexGen smart NoC IP from Arteris now integrates AI/ML-driven automation, enabling engineers to automatically generate, optimize, and verify interconnects with minimal manual effort. This automation streamlines IP integration, ensuring optimized bandwidth, lower latency, and improved data flow efficiency​.

Below are some reasons why FlexGen smart NoC IP is essential for designing optimized interconnects for complex SoCs:

1. Improving Wire Length and Latency: Wire length and latency are critical to SoC performance. FlexGen smart NoC IP reduces wire length by up to 30% while optimizing interconnect efficiency, leading to lower power consumption and higher data throughput. These improvements streamline data flow and ensure the design meets stringent performance requirements. Reduced latency further improves system performance, especially for real time processing.
2. Increasing Productivity: FlexGen smart NoC IP automates interconnect generation and tuning, increasing productivity by up to 10x. This enables engineers to iterate quickly, meet tight deadlines, and gain a competitive edge by bringing designs to market faster. The ability to quickly adapt to design changes and streamline iterations makes FlexGen invaluable because companies are operating under such demanding development schedules.
3. Optimizing Power, Performance, and Area: A major challenge for any SoC design is to balance power, performance, and area (PPA) within the constraints of the system architecture. FlexGen smart NoC IP optimizes routing and buffer placement to minimize congestion and achieve best-in-class PPA metrics, with a particular focus on reducing wire lengths for lower power consumption, improved latency and reduced area. This results in more efficient designs that meet the stringent requirements of modern applications, from AI accelerators to edge computing devices.
4. Reducing Manual Effort: Today’s SoCs integrate hundreds of IP blocks, often spread across multiple subsystems. FlexGen smart NoC IP ensures seamless communication between subsystems by automating interconnect generation, which simplifies design workflows and reduces manual effort. As designs grow increasingly complex, with heterogeneous blocks and diverse requirements, FlexGen ensures scalability and maintainability, improving the overwhelming workloads of engineering teams.
5. Automating Topology Generation: FlexGen leverages algorithmic automation to create efficient, physically aware topologies, improving latency and congestion management​. This process eliminates the need for extensive manual adjustments, significantly reducing design cycle time. Additionally, the FlexGen smart NoC IP supports incremental topology updates, allowing engineers to refine interconnect designs without reworking the entire NoC.

As SoC complexity continues to rise, engineers need solutions that not only optimize performance but also streamline design processes and resource management. FlexGen smart NoC IP bridges the expertise gap by embedding domain-specific knowledge into automation, enabling design teams to navigate interconnect challenges with greater efficiency. By leveraging AI/ML-driven optimization, these solutions allow engineers to focus on architectural innovations rather than manual tuning.

The growing demands of AI, high performance compute (HPC), and automotive applications make scalability, adaptability, and automation essential in NoC design. FlexGen’s ability to refine interconnect structures dynamically ensures that NoCs remain efficient as design requirements evolve. As semiconductor innovation accelerates, Arteris’ FlexGen smart NoC IP will be indispensable for delivering high-performance, power-efficient, and future-ready SoCs. To learn more about FlexGen, visit arteris.com.