Introduction to Lynguent Part II
The initial EDA Weekly article on Lynguent, Inc. appeared in EDAcafe.com on Monday November 15, 2010, and it has appeared every day since. You may refer to Lynguent Part I at the following URL:
During the initial interview with Lynguent representatives on September 10, 2010 at the Claremont Resort & Spa, it became clear to this writer that one installment of EDA Weekly would prove insufficient to adequately describe even the minimum attributes of this Portland, OR privately-held EDA entity.
Thus Lynguent Part I was devoted to briefly introducing the new CEO Sam Young and the founder and current CTO Martin Vlach, and to hinting at Lynguent’s specialty & raison d’être: To tackle one of the most difficult and ongoing problems in EDA -- dealing successfully with analog and analog mixed signal (AMS) systems, which are often subsystems of a companion digital systems product. As mentioned, “dealing successfully” this time around meant reaching a goal of a 10 to 1 improvement or more, compared to trying to write an analog model or AMS model purely with an HDL. The market opportunity for this nine year old company was also outlined.
This December 13, 2010 issue of EDA WEEKLY will first expand on the technical approach that Lynguent has taken in its software products to address the challenges of analog and analog mixed systems (AMS). We will name this portion Lynguent Part II Section One.
Secondly, we will provide more details on the backgrounds of several key Lynguent cognoscenti. We will cleverly name this second portion Lynguent Part II Section Two.
Lynguent Part II Section One:
Picking up on the introductory dialogue in the Lynguent Part I posting of November 15, 2010, it bears repeating what we had learned about the Technical Specialty of Lynguent at the Claremont luncheon: Starting in 2004, Dr. Martin Vlach and his Lynguent team had decided to tackle one of the most difficult and ongoing problems in EDA -- dealing successfully with analog and analog mixed signal (AMS) systems, which are often subsystems of a companion digital systems product. As mentioned, “dealing successfully” this time around meant reaching a goal of a 10 to 1 improvement or more, compared to trying to write the analog model or AMS model purely with an HDL.
That was when the writer asked Dr. Vlach, “Please walk us through the first few years of Lynguent activity from 2004 on.”
Martin had continued as follows: Lynguent began with the premise that the design and verification of 100% digital semiconductor chips was and is already well supported in the marketplace by the use of models written in either Verilog® (C) or VHDL (D). There are also good tools available that convert a model used at one stage of the digital design to a new model to be used at the next stage. Examples of such tools are high level synthesis, Register Transfer Level (RTL) synthesis, and physical synthesis tools.
Note: Capital letters in parentheses and numbers in brackets refer to Definitions and Footnotes, respectively, included at the conclusion of this month’s EDA WEEKLY.
Verification is mostly done by applying suitable test vectors to digital models, although in some situations FastSPICE (E) simulations may be done. A single simulation using all-digital models is reasonably fast, so the time to complete verification is largely dependent on the number of test vectors. So purely digital design and verification is already a well-served market.
Conversely, analog and mixed-signal (AMS) chips are still much more difficult to design and verify, and no general methodology seems to have become available (until Lynguent).
The main reasons were and are:
- Digital designers often do not understand the analog design issues, and vice versa. As a consequence, the analog and digital portions of a design are usually done independently and brought together rather late in the design process, leading to costly redesigns and delays if analog and digital don’t match up.
- There are no synthesis tools for AMS. Models needed at different stages of the design must be written manually, often by analog designers who are not comfortable working with a hardware description language (HDL).
- Verification that includes AMS models is inherently slow due to the involvement of an analog solver. Methodologies to speed this up are often proprietary and application specific. They include creating behavioral models whose parameters are tuned such that the model behavior matches that of the transistor level design
So the creation of suitable AMS models remained a major bottleneck in an AMS design. Such models are also needed in various forms (usually at different levels of abstraction) throughout the design phase and also to speed up verification. Additionally, meaningful verification requires an ability to tune the behavior of a model to match that of the transistor design. By providing unique products that breakthrough this bottleneck, Lynguent can enjoy an enviable position in its market niche.
The above was a review of the background dialogue contained in Lynguent Part I. We now proceed to new technical details.
AMS models have traditionally been written directly in the HDL using a text editor. Each model is a programming project, and the only tool available for this task has been the text editor. Although some advanced editors offer syntax directed editing for HDL’s, several difficulties remain:
- The model writer must have a basic understanding of the concepts supported by the HDL. This understanding can only be gained by adequate training and experience, and if unused it tends to become stale quickly.
- The requirement of HDL knowledge suggests that models should be written by specialized modeling engineers. This has two drawbacks. First, a dedicated modeling engineer likely will support more than one design team and will therefore not be intimately familiar with the design. Second, sharing of a modeling engineer between design teams may quickly lead to unavailability of the engineer when a design team needs the help.
- Writing an HDL model of an AMS device is a difficult task in general. Even for simple models it is not easy to get it right, in particular when starting the model from scratch. There are two reasons: keeping perspective of the model becomes increasingly challenging when the model grows because the HDL statements may have little relationship to the actual device, and writing an efficient model requires familiarity with aspects of analog simulation and in particular the analog solver.
- Model maintenance is difficult, particularly if different people work on the same model over time. Even if comments have been used, it is often difficult to understand what a specific statement does and why it is there.
- The complexity of many models prevents their reuse because the work required to make the model reusable is not cost effective. The result is that models are typically written from scratch or derived from existing models. In the latter case the model may be inefficient because the model writer may easily overlook that certain portions of code are no longer needed.
So AMS models are the backbone of an AMS design flow. They are required during the design phase, but also they are necessary for verification where behavioral models of portions of the chip matched to the behavior observed in a transistor level simulation may be used. To allow for continual refinement of a model during design, and to provide improved performance compared to a transistor level simulation during verification such models are written using an HDL: Verilog-A, Verilog-AMS, or VHDL-AMS.
Enter Lynguent’s Approach: Graphical Creation of Models
The Lynguent approach is based on the observation that designers typically prefer not to write code, but they are familiar with schematic capture systems. A schematic capture system supports the composition of a design by placing model instances on a canvas and connecting their ports. Lynguent’s ModLyng™ Integrated Modeling Environment (IME) provides an equivalent functionality to compose an individual model. With the ModLyng IMETM, a designer places building blocks from a library on the canvas and then connects their ports to describe the functionality of the model.
Consider the diagram below – which of the four approaches shown is most appealing?
Building blocks are very similar to models, i.e. they have ports, parameters and an implementation, and they are created and maintained in the ModLyng IME just like models. They typically implement a simple transformation of their inputs, which by itself may not seem very interesting, but their power becomes apparent when combined with other building blocks. Because of their simplicity building blocks become reusable immediately, and they enable the graphical composition of a model. Building blocks often cannot be simulated in isolation, but models constructed from building blocks are ready to be simulated: when the model is exported to be used by a simulator, the ModLyng IME arranges the code associated with the building blocks such that a correct model is generated.
Each of the Lynguent products includes several libraries of building blocks. Examples of such building blocks are comparators with or without hysteresis, mathematical functions, logic operations, various kinds of stimulus, and many more. Some building blocks even provide some event-driven capabilities for Verilog-A; traditionally Verilog-AMS would have been required for this functionality. Models constructed from the building blocks can be simulated with a variety of simulators supporting Verilog-A, Verilog-AMS, VHDL-AMS, and MAST®. (B, C, D).
The figure above demonstrates these capabilities. The pane on the right shows the implementation of an oscillator combined with a resettable counter. The frequency of the oscillator is selectable with the inputs A1 through A4. Their values are converted to a decimal number that is used to look up the frequency value in a table. This value then drives the actual pulse generator, whose output connects to the pulse counter and also to a value splitter. Their values are converted from a simple variable, indicated by purple wires, to electrical, indicated by black wires. The top left of the pane implements the reset logic. The left pane shows a collection of building block libraries loaded into the ModLyng IME, with the eb_Inverter_VV model selected. An instance of the model is annotated in the right pane.
Composing a model using building blocks has several important advantages over creating it using the HDL:
- The building blocks and their interconnection (the topology) reflect the function of the part and provide an intuitive documentation for its internal organization.
- The model creator does not have to worry about language syntax and semantics, as she works with graphical symbols to create a model of a part.
- The number of engineers able to create a behavioral model of a part increases significantly because no language skills are required for this task.
- Graphical composition of models is intuitive even if not done frequently.
- A model can be exported to several different dialects of a language and even to different languages from the same topology. To this end, the ModLyng IME will apply suitable transformations where necessary.
- Lynguent, Inc. provides several libraries of building blocks, but users can create their own. To create a new building block minimal language skills are required.
- Building blocks are typically relatively simple. As a consequence:
- Building blocks can be reused in many different models.
- It is easy for building block authors to understand the function of a building block.
- Testing of building blocks is straightforward and quick.
- Reuse of building blocks significantly reduces the risk of creating a new model because each building block is amply tested and known to work.
Models created from building blocks can themselves be placed in libraries. Lynguent, Inc. is using this approach to create libraries of AMS parts such as operational amplifiers, A/D converters, PLL’s, voltage regulators, and others. Each such model may have several versions that reflect different implementations of the part. For example, different model versions exist for A/D converters with binary or Grey encoding and flash, successive approximation and Wilkinson structures. Each also has a corresponding testbench, which in the Lynguent environment is just another model. The fact that these libraries of parts and testbenches are built from building block libraries immediately allows the parts to be exported to any of the supported languages and dialects.
Creation of Verification Models from Netlists
Creating a behavioral model of a semiconductor part intended to match the behavior of some transistor level simulation, typically based on a Spice netlist, builds on the foundation provided by the ModLyng IME and the building block libraries, but requires additional considerations. The process requires a basic understanding of what the part does and how it is organized, i.e. what functional blocks were used to create the part. This understanding may be gained from design documentation or from behavioral models used during the design phase.
A behavioral model created in a ModLyng DV Studio using the building block approach provides this information naturally.
As a first step a testbench is created that allows the transistor level model to be simulated in a context that reflects its use. The testbench will typically be obtained from a testbench library provided by Lynguent, Inc. and adapted to the specific needs of the device. Testbench creation includes defining the simulation scenarios to capture: stimulus, simulation parameters, and performance measures to capture, e.g. a rise time, an overshoot, or a waveform over time. The testbench with the netlist representing the transistor level model as device under test is then simulated from the ModLyng DV Studio to generate the target results to which the behavioral model will be matched.
The second step of the process is the creation of a behavioral model of the device with parameters that can be adjusted in a later step to match the target results. The behavioral model will typically be created using a model from the Lynguent parts library as a starting point, augmented as necessary with building blocks from the libraries available in the ModLyng DV Studio. Understanding the function and structure of the device is essential for this step.
Next, the device under test in the testbench created in step 1 is replaced by an instance of the newly created model. At this point the behavioral model is ready to be simulated in the same testbench as used to generate the target results. These simulations are carried out under the control of the Lynguent parameter tuning module, whose purpose is to adjust the parameters of the behavioral model such that its behavior matches the target results. This is an iterative process controlled by a python script.
Once the iterations have yielded a result it is up to the designer to determine whether the match is good enough. This is an important step that includes judgment because if there are many competing objectives a perfect match will not be possible. If the match is not good enough there are several possible remedies:
- Change the relative weight of some of the objectives.
- Enhance the behavioral model with additional effects that can deliver a better match. Such effects are available as building blocks in the Lynguent libraries.
- Use a different behavioral model from the parts library.
In all cases the third step has to be repeated, but if the behavioral model didn’t change or was enhanced with additional effects it will be possible to use the result from the first match attempt as a starting point. This sequence of steps is repeated until the match is acceptable.
To illustrate enhancing a model with additional effects consider the behavioral model of a simple LDO voltage regulator.
The circuit on the left shows the original model that includes all the basic controls of the regulator to make it operational. On the right a headroom effect has been added to reduce the upper limit of the output voltage and to match the actual device better. Effects of this kind can be found in Lynguent’s building block libraries, but additional effects can also be developed by end users.
The Lynguent Advantage
Lynguent, Inc. offers two products supporting the methodology described in the previous section, both using the ModLyng IME as their foundation and including toolkits containing building block libraries specific to the target use of the product.
- ModLyng DV Studio for Analog and Mixed-Signal targets the development of analog and AMS models of parts and subsystems. The product supports simulating these models in all popular simulators supporting Verilog-A, Verilog-AMS, VHDL-AMS, and MAST.
- ModLyng DV Studio for Event-Driven Mixed-Signal targets the development of models of analog and AMS parts and subsystems to be used in a digital flow. Such real number models use wreal ports in Verilog and real signal ports in VHDL and can be simulated in all popular Verilog-AMS and VHDL simulators. Using event-driven techniques, such models simulate two to three orders of magnitude faster than AMS models for the same device.
The products can be used as stand-alone tools in an AMS design flow, but they also interact with the Cadence® Virtuoso® environment. Support in the Lynguent products for quick and easy model composition using drag and drop of library building blocks facilitates the creation of different versions of a model targeted at different design phases.
This makes it possible to start modeling and simulation anywhere in the design and verification cycle, from system level design all the way through transistor level and the verification flow.
The ModLyng DV Studios are designed to be used as hubs in an AMS design flow. The hubs break the traditional practice that the analog and digital portions of a design are developed independently and enable early collaboration between the analog and digital design teams. This significantly reduces the risk across the AMS boundary, and it avoids surprises late in the design cycle. Moreover, the ability to create real number models significantly improves the productivity during verification, which makes it possible to reduce the verification time or to simulate more test vectors in the same time.
The benefit of the ModLyng DV Studios doesn’t stop here. Users can create their own building blocks and organize them in libraries that complement the ones provided by Lynguent, Inc. Users can also import legacy HDL models written in VHDL-AMS, Verilog-A and Verilog-AMS, which allows them to use such models seamlessly together with models created in the tool. A single model can be exported to multiple simulators that support different dialects of an HDL and even to different HDLs. This is particularly useful in a situation when a company must provide models of their parts that support different simulators: in a ModLyng DV Studio such a model needs to be composed just once. The scripting API, based on python, allows many operations on models and libraries to be scripted. Supported operations include the generation of design documentation from the data maintained by the ModLyng DV Studio of a model. Such design documentation may include, but is not limited to, a data sheet of a part.
The Promise
The ModLyng DV Studios and their foundation, the ModLyng IME, target AMS design flows. Through their graphical approach they revolutionize the generation and management of AMS models and enable a larger constituency of engineers to create models for simulating their designs. The products are currently being enhanced to include capabilities to validate models and match their behavior to measured data or data obtained from simulations with transistor level netlists.
Our thanks go to Lynguent’s Matt Francis for conducting a remote Internet-facilitated demo of Lynguent products for the writer and for Ms. Jean Armstrong.
In Summary
Lynguent Part II Section Two:
We begin this section with the two Lynguent executives who first visited with the writer back on September 10, 2010, at the Claremont luncheon hosted by Jean Armstrong of Armstrong & Associates Public Relations. These two are Sam Young, the new CEO, and Dr. Martin Vlach, the company founder and former CEO, and now the Chief Technical Officer (CTO).
As of September 14, 2010, the entire Lynguent Executive Team is as follows:
Individual BIO of Sam Young
Sam’s new job is to lead the Company to its next level of success. “I am thrilled to be joining Lynguent at this time,” said Young. “Over the past year, the company has made tremendous progress in realigning itself to meet its customers’ needs by interfacing (Lynguent software) seamlessly with the tools customers use. Lynguent has also broadened its product line and now has a large funnel of prospective customers who are confirming its technology. It is an exciting time for everyone involved with the company.”
Sam Young
Through the course of the Claremont lunch, Sam’s outstanding qualifications emerged, and these are described herein.
Firstly, Sam in no stranger to Lynguent, Inc. In fact, Sam met one of Lynguent’s current Board Members as far back as 1978. More recently, as part of a consulting contract with Lynguent for most of 2010, Sam’s company (aptly named “Young & Associates”) has been focused on Lynguent. Formed in March 2004, Young & Associates was established to assist pre-IPO companies. The firm engaged with a limited number of companies on a long-term (minimum one-year) contractual basis. Activities varied based on company, but they covered the spectrum of most company functions, such as acting in executive management positions, business development, product and market positioning & strategy, customer and investor presentations, business plans and financial analysis for P&L, sales channels development and management, HR activities including benefits, establishing the corporate “culture” and recruiting as well as PR activities, VC funding, contract review and strategic partnership opportunity development [1]. Clearly, Sam’s deep involvement with Lynguent over the nine-plus months prior to September 14, 2010 allowed him “to hit the ground running,” as they say, when he was made CEO.
In addition to consulting with Lynguent, from 2009 to 2010, Sam was also recently involved with Contour Semiconductor as VP Sales & Marketing.
Contour developed a low cost, high performance approach to producing a non-volatile memory capable of replacing NAND Flash and eventually (could replace) all memory types. The company employs state-of-the-art Phase Change Material as the storage mechanism. Sam defined and specified the product line, created a 5 year business plan and formed strategic relationships with
SMIC (3rd largest wafer foundry):
Ovonyx (phase change memory leader):
and Phison (leading memory controller maker & memory card maker):
to support Contour’s business needs, also including one of the world's largest Enterprise Storage companies. Sam participated in closing over $35 million in venture capital, including the first and only investment from SMIC in a customer.
Starting in 2002 Young was also a senior vice president with the M&A firm, “IDL,” where he provided consulting and M&A services for many emerging companies.
From 1995 to 2002, he served as the vice president of marketing for Hynix Semiconductor’s Flash Business Unit,
helping to grow its business from a start-up to over $100 million in sales.
Young also co-founded three other technology companies including Exel Microelectronics, Corsair Microsystems and Hyundai Electronics Flash memory division and held senior management positions with a number of other successful companies. In addition, he was director of the worldwide memory research at Dataquest and chair of the EIA/JEDEC standards committee for all memory.
Before exploring Sam’s background further, the writer was itching to learn what Sam planned to do immediately as Lynguent’s new CEO. So a week or so after the first meeting on September 10, the writer followed up with Sam and asked, “Sam, can you please review the new activities to be undertaken by Lynguent, now that you are CEO, compared to the last few years' activities?”
Sam unhesitatingly ticked off the following:
1) Building an even more extensive Lynguent Advisory Board and Board of Directors that will help enable the Company to accelerate the achievement its expanded goals. {Note: Sam is already moving aggressively on this imperative [2]}
2) Expanding Lynguent sales channels by opening additional sales offices both domestically as well as internationally, and entering into strategically-aligned reseller agreements with selected industry partners. The aggressive growth of our Company sales capacity is a clear priority for Lynguent.
3) Speed up the building of an overall world class Lynguent organization to support on-going research and product development as well, so as to meet the Company’s growth requirements for sales, marketing and customer support.
4) Establishing certain strong industry alliances and research partnerships that will introduce Lynguent into new market areas. For example, Lynguent is actively investigating the modeling of extreme environment effects that are part of Radiation Hardened By Design (RHBD) methodologies used in military and aerospace, and also in special terrestrial digital applications at small geometries. Additionally, Lynguent is investigating new technologies targeted specifically at the creation of models that can be leveraged in the simulation of Smart Grid power distribution and Electric Power Conversion for uses such as Electric Power Conversion for uses such as electric vehicles and many other areas. A future area of interest is in supporting the regulatory approval of implementable medical devices.
5) Enabling a Component and Subsystem Pre-sales Selection and Post-sales Integration through a “Lynguent Inside” concept. A key differentiator for Lynguent is that our products can be packaged both as EDA design tools and as tools for supporting customers’ sales and marketing efforts. Key to hitting our revenue targets is configuring the use of our products so that manufactures (creators) of electronic components and subsystems can provide value-added marketing and efficient post-sales support through the integration of ready IP blocks (IP protected models) or design kits that are “Powered by Lynguent ModLyng”. In doing so, we enable design teams (integrators) to be able to rapidly integrate outsourced IP into their products.
6) Last but not least, the Company has a new round of angel investment open and we are seeking $600,000 to $1,000,000. Target closure is by the end of December 2010 or early January 2011. I plan to use the pre-release of your first EDA WEEKLY on Lynguent to help secure these potential angel investors.
These six items certainly echo the comments made by Dr. Martin Vlach, Lynquent’s founder and CTO, upon the confirmation of Sam Young as the new Lynguent CEO: “I am very pleased Lynguent has been able to attract a leader of Sam’s caliber. Sam served on our advisory board and is very familiar with our company, our products and our tremendous potential. Sam’s background in defining and specifying product lines, forging strategic alliances and directing sales and marketing, is exactly what we need as Lynguent enters a critical time in its history—broadening its reach into the semiconductor and systems market while forging new strategic alliances.”
Sam’s Personal Background:
Sam was born in 1947 and reared in Brooklyn, New York by parents Helen and Joseph Yonofsky. The family included a sister to Sam named Janice, 5 years Sam’s senior. Working many part time jobs throughout his youth in Brooklyn, Sam graduated from Brooklyn’s well-known James Madison High School in 1965.
James Madison High School, Brooklyn, NY USA
Including Sam, other notables who attended James Madison were US Senators Coleman, Schumer and Sanders; Ruth Bader Ginsburg; several Nobel Laureates; Carole King; Chris Rock, and many others.
Between 1965 and 1968, Sam completed a two-year degree at the RCA Institute,
then transferred to the Pratt Institute, where he received his Bachelor’s Degree in EE in 1970, graduating 3rd in his class.
DeKalb Avenue Gate , Clinton Hill
CampusPratt Institute Brooklyn NY
At Pratt, Sam was elected to Tau Beta Pi.
Sam then went to work for Raytheon in Norwood MA for the period 1970 to 1971, subsequently took post-graduate courses at Stevens University and Seton Hall, and served in the National Guard.
Numerous increasingly-responsible positions at various electronics and semiconductor companies took Sam to Texas and eventually to the San Francisco Bay Area, where he and his spouse currently reside.
Sam, earlier in
his career
Sam has been married to his high school sweetheart Stefanie for 41 years, and the couple has three children all born in the 70’s. All are doing well.
Just at the conclusion of the interview, Sam was also excited to share this latest news with the writer, "By the way, Russ, we now have established a Taiwan office, we have reached an agreement to set up a Korean sales operation, and we have added a sales executive in the Central USA."
Individual Bio of Dr. Martin Vlach
Having been “around the block a few times” himself, the moment the writer met Dr. Martin Vlach at the Claremont, he recognized a keen and formidable intelligence. This instant assessment was further reinforced during the initial luncheon and then verified by research into Dr. Vlach's background over the intervening weeks since. It is a pleasure to provide a glimpse of this assessment to EDA WEEKLY readers.
Martin Vlach was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1950, the only son of Jiri and Dagmar Vlach. In their twenties, both parents were formidable intellects destined for brilliant careers in academia and/or industry in their native land. A chip off both parental blocks, Martin displayed considerable early intellectual promise when he attended and graduated from a nationally-renowned Czech math and physics magnet high school in 1968, and was accepted at the world-famous Charles University in Prague. Founded in 1347, Charles University was attended by many eminent individuals, including Franz Kafka, Albert Einstein, and scores of others equally recognizable. The University is still ranked number one in the Czech Republic and second in all of Central and Eastern Europe to Moscow State University.
Of course, Eastern Europe has been nothing if not a hotbed of political and national struggles throughout its history. Such intrigue interrupted young Martin's university plans, when in the summer of 1968, he and his parents departed Prague for a camping vacation by pure good fortune only five hours before Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia to halt Alexander Dubček's 'Prague Spring' political liberalization reforms.
(While the United States opposed the invasion at the UN, the US could not do much without risking war with the Soviets, who still sported a strong, nuclear-armed military in 1968).
Martin was not to return to Prague until 22 years later, following the so-called “Velvet Revolution” when, because of relatively massive but peaceful Czech street protests, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia announced in November 1989 that it would relinquish power and dismantle the single-party state. Soon thereafter, Václav Havel was elected President of Czechoslovakia, events that made news even in America.
Returning for a moment to Martin's youth, between 1950 and 1968, both his father's and his mother's technical careers flourished. Both had earned Ph.D. degrees, Jiri's in EE, Dagmar's in Biochemistry. She went on to do important research in industrial diseases and converting farm waste into biofuels.
Jiri was doing work in, and published books about, the use of computers in electronic design, which is what we call “EDA” these days. By getting young Martin to assist, Jiri instilled a strong interest in EDA in his son. Of course, Jiri was using rudimentary Russian computers with paper tape I/O in those days, but hey, that mirrors the type of tools that many of us used here in the USA in our early efforts in mechanical CAE - Model 33 teletype access to rudimentary GE time sharing computers in the mid 60's, with yes, paper tape I/O.
Martin's parents also introduced their son to snow skiing before he was five years old; skiing became a life-long passion for Martin as a result.
During these early years, Jiri had often been invited out of Czechoslovakia for multiyear visiting professorships. Martin was not permitted by the Czech government to accompany his parents on these assignments. One such foray had taken Martin's mother and father to the University of Illinois, where Jiri taught EE's for two years 1966-67 & 1967-68. Jiri and Dagmar had just returned to Prague from Illinois a few months prior to the family's fortuitous camping trip.
Jiri had originally been invited to teach at the University of Illinois by Dean Mac VanValkenburg, whom Jiri had met (and impressed) at a conference some years earlier. Rather than return to besieged Prague after the camping trip, the Vlach family of three met Dean Mac VanValkenberg in Belgrade, Serbia at a conference. Mac took them to the US Embassy there, vouched for immediate visas, and helped Jiri secure an extension on his Illinois visiting professorship. A month later, young Martin found himself in New York City, getting a full dose of US vibrancy for the first time in the 60's.
The family immediately went back to the University of Illinois for Jiri's visiting professorship, and Martin studied there for a year as well. Then his father became part of the University of Waterloo, Ontario, so they all moved to Canada! Martin proceeded to accumulate multiple degrees at the University of Waterloo, including a BMath (1975) and MASc/EE (1980).
Martin then considered attractive job offers from Bell Labs and Bell Northern Research, but ultimately he opted instead to return to the University of Waterloo for his Ph.D./EE, which he earned in 1984.
Martin's Ph.D. work in EE led directly to his enduring interest and special expertise in “hardware description languages” and analog simulation. During his Ph.D. work in the early 80's, he obtained financial sponsorship from the Canadian National Science and Engineering Research Council (NSERC). Once his degree was in hand, the now Dr. Vlach applied for a financial grant to continue his work. The grant was denied, since “analog simulation was deemed to be a solved problem.”
A lucky break, because Dr. Vlach instead decided (at age 35) to leverage the software he had developed for his Ph.D. to found a start-up to continue the work. The start-up soon became “Analogy”, formally incorporated in January 1985. Early funding came from Martin's former father-in-law, who just happened to be a Swiss banker.
Around this same time period, Dr. Vlach consulted at Canada's Bell Northern Research in Kanata, Ontario for 1-½ years.He then decided to join the co-founder of Analogy in the USA, and Martin moved to Oregon in 1986. So Analogy was located in the Portland suburb of Beaverton, the same small community about 7 miles west of Portland where Mentor Graphics was located from 1981 until its early-1990's move 18 miles south to Wilsonville, OR.
Dr. Vlach's parents remained in Waterloo, Ontario. Sadly, his mother Dagmar passed away in 1999. However, now 88 years old, Martin's father Jiri is still in Waterloo as an EE Professor Emeritus, and a fellow of IEEE. Remarkably, Jiri is working on an update edition to his last book, “Computer Methods for Circuit Analysis and Design.”
Career Prosperity
For the 15 years Martin served at Analogy, Inc., he was a member of its Board of Directors and as well as its Chief Scientist. He was instrumental in attracting substantial angel investment to Analogy prior to its successful 1997 IPO and subsequent acquisition for a cash price from Avant! announced in December 1999 as $24 million.
The Avant! purchase of Analogy closed in early 2000. (More than 10X the size of Analogy when the acquisition of Analogy occurred, Avant! was headquartered in Fremont, CA. Two years later, Avant! itself became part of Synopsys, Inc. in a controversial M&A deal that was announced in December 2001 and finally closed in June 2002 after a lengthy FTC review).
Dr. Vlach had departed from Avant! in 2001 to found Lynguent, many months before Synopsys tendered its first offer to acquire Avant!. (Martin was fortunate to have been completely absent from the subsequent Synopsys/Avant! situation, which involved lawsuits, insurance against acquisition failure, allegations of IP theft, and the FTC issues).
In the year prior to its acquisition by Avant!, Analogy had an employment of over 200 people and revenue of $28 million. At Analogy, Martin conceived of and architected both the SABER simulator (A) and the MAST (B) hardware description language (HDL), products which are still used worldwide by Synopsys customers to design a wide variety of systems, from complex mixed-signal (analog and digital) integrated circuits (ICs) to mixed technology consumer, automotive, and aerospace systems including electronic, hydraulic, mechanical, and optical components.
Lifelong Interests
His travels and residences throughout his 60 years in various parts of the world, have resulted in Dr. Vlach maintaining official citizenship in three countries (The US, Canada, and of course the Czech Republic). This circumstance provides Martin and Lynguent with multiple advantages. Martin also speaks 3 languages fluently (Czech, French and English), and he also has a reasonable ability to speak and understand some German, Russian, and Spanish). This of course helps explain his ongoing interest in language and linguistics. It also speaks to why Lynguent has such a funny name, and why he is especially sensitive to serve users that have special language requirements.
Dr. Vlach tries to maintain balance in his life by turning as frequently as possible to his love of skiing, mountain hiking and in recent years, snowboarding!
Two years his sister's junior and graduate of New York University (NYU), son Eric is an international professional dancer based in New York, and also serves as the IT expert for Lynguent.
Lynguent today
Martin's role in Lynguent, the subject company of this two-part EDA WEEKLY sequence, has been and of course remains pivotal. His selection of key technical and management personnel for Lynguent would naturally reflect his knowledge of colleagues and friends from his previous lifetime and his deep, successful start-up experience at Analogy. These include but are not limited to Barbara Bakken, Ernst Christen, Jim Holmes, Alan Mantooth, Eva Solarova, and many others.
Keeping in mind the current management team at Lynguent, here are just some of the people besides Sam Young that Martin has brought into Lynguent in the past:
Dr. Alan Mantooth is a co-founder of Lynguent. He is also a professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering at the University of Arkansas and holds the 21st Century Chair in Mixed-Signal IC Design and CAD where he has directed over $20 million in externally funded research. He has over 20 years of experience developing models, and modeling methods and tools. He returned to academia in 1998 after eight years at Analogy (now a part of Synopsys, Inc.), where he directed a team of 10 engineers on modeling tool research. Alan holds three patents on software architecture for modeling and simulation tools and has published over 100 refereed articles on models and modeling tools. He has developed semiconductor device models for MOSFETs, diodes, power diodes, IGBTs, SCRs, and most recently SiC diodes, SiC MOSFETs, SiC SITs and JFETs, and SiC thyristors. Martin Vlach says Alan influenced the early direction of Lynguent towards modeling, and away from debugging; worked out to be the better direction. Alan holds a Ph.D. from Georgia Tech.
Barbara Bakken is a co-founder of Lynguent. She brings over 20 years of business experience in managing projects, programs, and teams. Throughout her career she has sought out opportunities to work in all areas of running a business. Barbara has a diverse background that ranges from conducting market research, developing and delivering corporate training programs, and managing employee relations programs. From 1996 to 2004 Barbara managed Analogy's Saber Simulator (Analog/Mixed-Signal Simulation) research and development team through an IPO and subsequent acquisitions at by Avant! and Synopsis. She is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) from the Project Management Institute. Barbara holds a BA in Sociology from Humboldt State University and an MS in Industrial and Labor Relations Management (MILR) from the University of Oregon. Martin Vlach says Barbara joined His company on St. Martin's Day, which is November 11; one of his best St. Martin's day presents ever!
Jim Holmes joined Lynguent after 13 years at Texas Instruments, where he was an analog/mixed-signal system-on-chip (SoC) modeling and simulation specialist. While there he focused on validation and verification of over 40 SoCs, spanning consumer applications from servo control in hard disk drives to baseband processing in cellular phones. He supported AMS modeling activities worldwide at Texas Instruments' design centers, as well as its customer and contractor sites. He developed key modeling methods that unified specification, design, and test activities across the globe. In 2004, Jim was elected Senior Member Technical Staff at Texas Instruments. Jim Holmes was an early user of Saber/MAST at TI, and Martin Vlach says he was delighted to get Jim on board at Lynguent when offered the chance. Jim currently leads Lynguent's research team that is commercializing an expert system for analog/mixed-signal model composition and analysis. He holds a BS and an MS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Connecticut.
Ernst Christen, before joining Lynguent, held leading positions at Analogy, Inc., Avant! Corporation, and Synopsys, Inc. working on mixed-signal simulation, modeling technology and language design. He was the principal investigator for two DARPA contracts in the area of analog and mixed-signal hardware description languages. As the vice-chair of the IEEE P1076.1 Working Group and a co-chair of its language design committee, Ernst has made major contributions to the definition of IEEE Std. 1076.1 (VHDL-AMS). He continues to serve as chair of this group. He was also the lead developer of SAE standard J2748 - VHDL-AMS Statistical Analysis Packages. Ernst holds three patents and is the author of over 40 publications. His interests include hardware description languages and mixed-signal multi-technology simulation. Ernst received a Diploma in Electrical Engineering and the Dr.sc.techn. degree from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, Switzerland, in 1975 and 1985, respectively. From 1985 to 1987, he was with the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, as a postdoctoral fellow.
Martin Vlach met Ernst for the first time in 1976 when Martin's father was on sabbatical at ETH Zurich (Eidgenössischen Technischen Hochschule Zürich) and Ernst was a student there. Ernst eventually became a post-doc with Martin's father Jiri, and Ernst came to work for one year in 1987 at Analogy. Except for a brief hiatus when Ernst stayed with the SABER team at Synopsys, Ernst has been Martin's colleague the longest of any other. Ernst was also “adopted” by Martin's young children as their “uncle” a long time ago; he's still an honorary member of the Vlach family.
Eva Solarova has over 25 years of experience managing teams in architecture, specification, design, and implementation of information technology systems. She was head of the department of information technology at Czech Television until 2005. Eva also spent 2 years working in the Research Institute for Telecommunication and Electronics. Eva joined Lynguent s.r.o. Prague in 2006. She graduated from Charles University in Prague with degrees in Math and Physics.
Martin has also shown keen perception in associating Lynguent with outstanding individuals at the board and advisor levels. Space does not permit discussing the Lynguent Board of Directors or the Advisory Board here, but the current members of both are respectively listed with their backgrounds on the Lynguent web site at:
Each list includes the newest members mentioned earlier in this article.
Definitions of terms used in “Lynguent Parts I & II”
See: http://www.synopsys.com/Tools/SLD/Mechatronics/Saber/Pages/default.aspx
See: http://www.synopsys.com/tools/sld/mechatronics/saber/pages/mast.aspx
(D) VHDL (VHSIC = Very-High-Speed Integrated Circuit) Hardware Description Language). Also according to the EDA Glossary provided by the EDA CONSORTIUM website, VHDL is the other one of two standardized hardware description languages used to specify the structure and behavior of electronic systems in textual format. Supports behavioral, register-transfer-level (RTL), and gate-level logic descriptions. Developed by the industry in the mid-1980s through funding by the U.S. Department of Defense, VHDL is also a de jure standard promulgated by the Institute of Electric and Electronic Engineers (IEEE).
(E) SPICE (Simulation Program with Integrated Circuit Emphasis) Also according to the EDA Glossary provided by the EDA CONSORTIUM website, SPICE is an industry-standard analog simulation language which contains models for most circuit elements and can handle complex nonlinear circuits. Also refers to a freely-distributed simulation tool which simulates circuitry described in the SPICE language. According to the website “All About EDA” by Simon Young, FastSPICE is one among several second generation circuit simulators that were born of necessity when custom, usually digitally-dominated, IC designs overtook the capacity and run-time capabilities of SPICE. Several innovations in EDA enabled Fast-SPICE simulators, yet their application isn't without some limitations and care has to be taken in modeling and simulation both to ensure the results obtained are valid, according to Young.
Copyrights of names used in “Lynguent Parts I & II”
Lynguent®is a Registered Trademark of Lynguent, Inc. ModLyng™ is a Trademark of Lynguent, Inc.
All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Cadence® , Verilog® and Virtuoso® are Registered Trademarks of Cadence Design Systems.
MAST® is a Registered Trademark of Synopsys, Inc.
© 2002-2010 Skullbox
SABER is a registered trademark of Sabremark Limited partnership and is used under license
Footnotes
[1] Footnote: The type of consulting assignments taken on by Young & Associates resonated well with the writer, as he too has carried out similar projects with selected clients of Henke Associates over the years since 1996, including taking on acting management roles for certain periods of time in selected client situations.
[2] Footnote: CEO Sam Young is already moving aggressively on the imperative to build an even more extensive Lynguent Advisory Board and Board of Directors. On November 1, 2010 the Company added Errol Moore to its board of directors. Moore, who is corporate vice president and manager of Orbotech, San Jose and president of Photon Dynamics, served for 28 years at Motorola in various divisions as corporate vice president, vice president, director and manager.
Then on November 03, 2010 the Company welcomed Young Hwan (YH) Kim to its advisory board. Kim is executive chairman of Korean-based PENCO Energy Inc. which focuses on securing energy blocks primarily in Indonesia. Prior to this Kim served for over 30 years with the Hyundai Group in various positions, eventually as president and CEO at Hyundai Electronics Industries, a $9 billion conglomerate.
Then on November 15, 2010 the Company announced that it had added Jack Saltich to its advisory board. Saltich has over 30 years of experience in semiconductor and systems industries and currently serves on the board of directors of several well-known semiconductor companies. He is interim CEO and chairman of the board of directors of Vitex Systems, a developer of transparent ultra-thin barrier films for use in the manufacture of next-generation flat panel displays. Before that, until 2005, he served for six years as president and CEO of Three-Five Systems, Inc., a company specializing in the design, development and manufacturing of custom LCD displays and display systems. Saltich's extensive knowledge of semiconductor and systems markets and his management expertise complement that of the other Lynguent advisory board members.
Then on November 17, 2010 the Company welcomed Joe Agiato to its advisory board. Agiato is the president of Newlight Asset Partners, where he is responsible for overseeing all of the company's operations. Prior to that, he was president of Newlight Capital LLC, a boutique investment banking firm, and a managing director of Licent Capital, a specialty finance company focused on securitizing royalty streams from patented technology.
Also on November 17, 2010 the Company welcomed Mike Hill, Ph.D to its advisory board. Hill is managing director of learning and organization development for Lam Research Corporation. His expertise is in leadership development and organizational effectiveness.
Starting with the initial EDA WEEKLY article posted on November 09, 2009, the first year's series of EDA WEEKLY articles by this writer continued on December 07, 2009, with the publication of an article entitled, “MAD Progress.” It was the second of thirteen debut-year articles through October 2010, the thirteen issues a result of the schedule of publishing every four weeks:
http://www10.edacafe.com/nbc/articles/2/764356/MAD-Progress
The Mentor Graphics FloTHERM software solution optimized for electronics cooling applications has become the leading computational fluid dynamics (CFD) thermal tool in the electronics vertical market. Figure 1 illustrates a typical FloTHERM view depicting the heat flow paths from an IC device, from the silicon outward.
With the October 2010 announcement of FloTHERM 9, the software product gained capabilities that are unmatched by any other solution in the field. Innovative new post-processing features within FloTHERM now enable electronic device and system designers to understand why a design might be running too hot. Two newly-developed quantitative measures and displays help users visualize critical-and formerly invisible-thermal characteristics in their designs. The Bottleneck (Bn) number identifies flow paths that exhibit high heat but at the same time, resist the flow of that heat. The Shortcut (Sc) number reveals opportunities for alternate and more efficient heat flow paths; in other words, shortcuts for the heat.
Ultimately the Bn and Sc values add to the designer's understanding of the ease with which heat leaves a system, and then help him or her reconfigure heat flux distribution to improve performance. A redesign informed by the Bn and Sc data can do more than just recognize bottlenecks; it can also bypass them.
Figure 2 shows the results of such a Sc analysis. The Printed Circuit Board (PCB) has a large Ball Grid Array (BGA) processor device at its center, and a previous Bn characterization (not shown) has revealed the component to be an area of troublesome heat concentration. But the Sc view implies that an easy fix is available. The blue-to-red color gradation on the BGA is not a temperature reading; instead it indicates areas of more efficient heat conduction as expressed by the Sc values on the scale to the right (higher values are better). Heat is most inclined to travel up through the top of the IC. A conventional heat sink is all that's needed to transport the heat away from the processor.
To cite a less elementary real-world example, FloTHERM 9 and Bn/Sc recently spared IC designers many weeks of iterative design attempts in the development of a new cell phone charger product. Engineers were able to model thermal vias, extended copper planes, and evaluate other approaches without having to wait for physical prototypes.
Heat density is increasing rapidly in almost every electronic application. The need for thermal tools that provide answers-not just data-is urgent. In the realm of IC and PCB design, the Mentor Graphics FloTHERM 9 breakthrough equips designers to quickly identify and solve thermal problems ranging from subtle to extreme.
Thanks go to out to Mentor Graphics' Ms. Suzanne Graham and Dr. Erich Buergel for their vignette to celebrate the EDA WEEKLY ONE YEAR LATER program.
Among the eleven additional EDA WEEKLY postings during that first year, seven featured six more EDA-related companies, two of the six covered companies which are privately-held and four publicly-traded.
The remaining four of the eleven additional freshman year postings were editorial commentaries on the economy & semiconductors, the economy and the EDA Industry, the State of IP (Intellectual Property), and “Whither EDA?”
The Second Year
The second year of EDA WEEKLY articles by this writer began on November 15. 2010 with “Lynguent Part I,” followed of course on December 13, 2010 by “Lynguent Part II,” the issue that you are currently reading.
One Year Later (last month)
In observance of the one-year anniversary (November 09, 2010) of the appearance of the writer's first EDA WEEKLY article, “The Role of Business Planning,” the special promotion that would have ended December 01, 2010 to obtain a reduced-price special copy of the entire Planning Tool Kit (PTK) was extended to May 01, 2011.
To obtain details on the extended "2010 - 2011 Business Planning Tool Kit Promotion" from HENKE ASSOCIATES, please click on the URL below and scroll to the last entry on that page:
About the Writer:
Since 1996, Dr. Russ Henke has been and remains active as president of HENKE ASSOCIATES, a San Francisco Bay Area high-tech business & management consulting firm. The number of client companies for Henke Associates now numbers more than forty. During his corporate career, Henke operated sequentially on "both sides" of MCAE/MCAD and EDA, as a user and as a vendor. He's a veteran corporate executive from Cincinnati Milacron, SDRC, Schlumberger Applicon, Gould Electronics, ATP, and Mentor Graphics. Henke is a Fellow of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) and served on the SME International Board of Directors. Henke was also a board member of SDRC, PDA, ATP, and the MacNeal Schwendler Corporation, and he currently serves on the board of Stottler Henke Associates, Inc. Henke is also a member of the IEEE and a Life Fellow of ASME International. In April 2006, Dr. Henke received the 2006 Lifetime Achievement Award from the CAD Society, presented by CAD Society president Jeff Rowe at COFES2006 in Scottsdale, AZ. In February 2007, Henke became affiliated with Cyon Research's select group of experts on business and technology issues as a Senior Analyst. This Cyon Research connection aids and supplements Henke's ongoing, independent consulting practice (HENKE ASSOCIATES). Dr. Henke is also a contributing editor of the EDACafé EDA WEEKLY, and he has published EDA WEEKLY articles every four weeks since November 2009; URL's available.
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-- Russ Henke, EDACafe.com Contributing Editor.