The Week In Review: Design

Synopsys inked a deal to acquire Coverity, a San Francisco-based security startup that builds tools to test source code for defects and security risks, for $375 million. The purchase price is $350 million plus another $25 million in debt. The deal is expected to close in Synopsys’ fiscal Q2. The company announced its financial results for fiscal Q1 ended Jan. 31, as well. Revenue was $479.0 million, up 1% from the $475.1 million it reported in the same period in 2013. Net income was $67.696 million, down from $69.922 million in Q1 2013.

Cadence unveiled a slew of new technology. Topping the list is a new imaging and video processor core with a 4X performance increase. The company is positioning the new core for face and gesture recognition, augmented reality, auto lane departure warning systems and object detection, among other things. Cadence also teamed up with Sensory, a speech recognition and biometric company, to create 28nm low-power application processors for smartphones, tablets, TVs, set-top boxes, and other devices that are always on. The new chip consumes one-third the power of the previous version.  Cadence also said that Rubidium’s speech processing software is now available for its audio/voice DSPs, along with Movea’s motion processing and data fusion technology.  And it unveiled the next generation of its baseband DSP family. In addition, Cadence completed its acquisition of Forte Design Systems.  That deal was announced on Feb. 4.

CEVA enhanced its DSP library for its imaging and vision platform, adding more than 750 functions plus simplified programming for a number of markets, including mobile, automotive, surveillance and the IoT.  The company also inked a deal with nViso to bring 3D facial imaging and emotion recognition technology to mobile devices.  In addition, CEVA won a deal with Chonqing CYIT Communication Technology Co., which ill use its multi-mode wireless based band chips for 4G smartphones and tablets.

Arteris has rebuilt its engineering team, tapping industry veterans from Apple, Silicon Graphics and Sonics. The previous team was absorbed by Qualcomm along with some of the NoC technology.

A study by Transparency Market Research predicts that the gallium nitride market will grow from $380 million in 2012 to $2.2 billion by 2019, with the fastest growth in Asia/Pacific.

IDC, meanwhile, predicts that China’s smartphone shipments will hit 420 million this year, up 19.8% from last year. But the firm also says the growth rate will plug this year, down from 63.6% in 2013.