What's PR got to do with it? Posts Tagged ‘Jim Hogan’Ajoy Bose and Jim Hogan on the systems customers now defining SoC designTuesday, September 4th, 2012
 Jim Hogan  Ajoy Bose
Atrenta CEO Ajoy Bose and EDA visionary and investor Jim Hogan spoke at a recent National Institute of Technology (NIT) meeting on the momentous changes we see in who controls chip design these days. Clearly, systems companies like Apple define – even dictate – what they want from their silicon vendors..and these systems customers certainly want a lot more than they did ten years ago. Jim tells us why we have to care: Ajoy shows us how to care:
Lee PR does work for Atrenta Hogan on Atrenta’s grabMonday, August 6th, 2012
We’ve seen several acquisitions in the past month or so…and wanted to get a sense of what these purchases might or might not indicate about where EDA is going. So we went to the premier visionary and investor to get his take on how the EDA world will be affected by this apparent consolidation. Ed: What do these acquisitions over the past month or so mean to EDA? 1. there is no product overlap 2. the sales channel can immediately sell the product. Usually this means that the AEs support it or at least will be product within 30 days of purchase. There is a ton of synergy with the Atrenta sales channel. This is important to ensure the ROI is met, typically a two to three year process. 3. customers support the merger. In other words, they see that the product is going to be continued to be supported with R&D and AEs. 4. the team remains at least two years to ensure intellectual property transition. In the case of Atrenta and NextOp, I believe all conditions are being met. Thus I expect a successful integration of NextOp and ROI. In addition it speaks to Atrenta’s forward progress to being an IPO candidate. One issue for EDA is that companies exiting over the last ten years have been through acquisition. If we can see an IPO of a well-run and well-performing company, it attracts the attention of shareholders but also ensures an exit other than acquisition for other EDA companies. This will attract investors and thus we’ll see startups funded. This is a win-win for the entire ecosphere including customers. I believe one of the key ingredients in an EDA company going public besides top line revenue of greater than $50m with 25% CAGR and margin of $10m or greater is the ability of the management team to acquire and integrate complementary startups. With Atrenta acquiring NextOp, I believe they are on their way. Good luck to them because their IPO will be good for EDA by bringing excitement and notice to the sector.
Lee PR does work for Atrenta
Atrenta acquires NextOp – Could this be the start of something BIG?Wednesday, June 20th, 2012
Gary Smith’s statement about the Atrenta acquisition of NextOp has been bandied about this morning in the news….“This could be the start of something big, and NextOp was an excellent place to start.” See today’s news and analysis about Atrenta’s acquisition of assertion synthesis vendor NextOp plus an interview with Atrenta and NextOp execs in the following online publications: EDA Café Blog: What Would Joe Do?
————– Lee PR does work for Atrenta Atrenta buys NextOpWednesday, June 20th, 2012
Atrenta Accelerates Growth in Front End Design with Acquisition of NextOp Software, Inc. SpyGlass design productivity enhancements expanded to functional verification for semiconductor and consumer electronics developers SAN JOSE, Calif — June 20, 2012 — Atrenta Inc., a leading provider of SoC Realization solutions for the semiconductor and electronic systems industries, today announced that it has acquired NextOp Software, Inc., a leading provider of assertion synthesis technology. Atrenta’s products focus on improving efficiency and reducing cost for the design of complex semiconductor IP and system-on-chip (SoC) devices while NextOp’s products focus on improving efficiency and reducing cost for the functional verification of IPs and SoCs. The combination of both company’s products creates a more complete SoC Realization platform. The acquisition of NextOp allows Atrenta to expand its de-facto standard SpyGlass® register transfer level (RTL) platform to include functional verification — an important and costly component of advanced SoC design. Utilizing patented static and formal analysis techniques, the SpyGlass platform currently provides RTL design efficiency improvements in the areas of linting, clock synchronization, power optimization, testability, timing constraints and physical routing congestion. The SpyGlass platform will now be expanded to include functional verification support using NextOp’s patented dynamic assertion synthesis technology, resulting in verification efficiency improvements for semiconductor and consumer electronics developers. “The addition of NextOp’s functional verification technology will give our customers a distinct advantage by providing complete coverage of front end design activities,” said Dr. Ajoy Bose, chairman, president and CEO of Atrenta. “Atrenta’s customers have come to rely on SpyGlass to verify a broad range of design intent, but functional verification was a missing part of our platform. NextOp’s assertion synthesis completes this part of our offering – Atrenta customers will now have added confidence that their designs will work as expected while meeting schedule and performance requirements. We are very excited to bring these innovative solutions and the resulting expanded benefits to our large customer base. ” “Atrenta is one of the largest private EDA companies,” said Dr. Yunshan Zhu, president and CEO of NextOp Software. “NextOp has pioneered assertion synthesis technology. Our tool is now widely deployed in production at multiple tier 1 customers – many of whom also use SpyGlass. Atrenta’s world-class field operation will further accelerate the mainstream adoption of assertion synthesis.” “I’ve heard good things about NextOp’s verification technology from some impressive customers – the combination of Atrenta’s RTL design and NextOp’s RTL verification technology will improve the entire SoC Realization process,” said Jim Hogan, EDA industry veteran and private investor. “I’m also glad to see private/private acquisitions like this happening again after such a long dry spell. Atrenta could be leading a trend in renewed growth for the EDA sector.” “With the acquisition of Magma there has been renewed talk about a roll-up in the middle of the EDA community,” saidGary Smith, founder and chief analyst for Gary SmithEDA. “The most obvious candidates are the RTL sign-off tool vendors, and the most talked about driver, of the roll-up, has been Atrenta. This could be the start of something big, and NextOp was an excellent place to start.” NextOp’s BugScope assertion synthesis tool will be sold and supported by the combined Atrenta/NextOp worldwide field organization. Dr. Yunshan Zhu will assume the role of vice president, new technologies reporting to Dr. Ajoy Bose. Dr. Yuan Lu, co-founder and CTO of NextOp will assume the role of chief verification architect reporting to Dr. Zhu. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed. About Assertion Synthesis Assertion synthesis leverages design and test bench information to automatically generate high quality assertions and functional coverage properties. Generating assertions and coverage properties manually is tedious and error-prone. Assertions represent a machine-readable version of design intent and are used to improve verification completeness. Functional coverage properties identify functional coverage deficiencies providing guidance for verification teams. When used together, design teams can reduce functional verification time and improve overall functional coverage, resulting in lower design costs, better first-time silicon success and improved quality. About Atrenta Atrenta’s SpyGlass® Predictive Analysis software platform significantly improves design efficiency for the world’s leading semiconductor and consumer electronics companies. Patented solutions provide early design insight into the demanding performance, power and area requirements of the complex system on chips (SoCs) fueling today’s consumer electronics revolution. More than two hundred companies and thousands of design engineers worldwide rely on SpyGlass to reduce risk and cost before traditional EDA tools are deployed. SpyGlass functions like an interactive guidance system for design engineers and managers, finding the fastest and least expensive path to implementation for complex SoCs. SpyGlass from Atrenta: Insight. Efficiency. Confidence. www.atrenta.com About NextOp Software NextOp Software, Inc. is focused on delivering assertion-based verification solutions that allow design and verification teams to uncover bugs, expose functional coverage holes, and increase verification observability. NextOp’s BugScope assertion synthesis is the first product to automatically generate whitebox assertions and functional coverage properties in SVA, PSL and Verilog formats. BugScope’s properties are used to drive progressive, targeted verification via robust, executable design specifications for existing simulation, formal and emulation flows. The company is headquartered at2900 Gordon Avenue, Suite 100,Santa Clara,CA95051. For more information, visit www.nextopsoftware.com or call +1 408-830-9885. ******************************************************* © 2012 Atrenta Inc. All rights reserved. Atrenta, the Atrenta logo and SpyGlass are registered trademarks of Atrenta Inc. BugScope and NextOp are trademarks of NextOp Software, Inc. All others are the property of their respective holders. This press release contains forward-looking statements. Atrenta disclaims any obligation and does not undertake to update or revise the forward-looking statements in this press release.
—————————- Lee PR does work for Atrenta
The SpyGlass® value interviewsFriday, June 1st, 2012
Atrenta has pulled together quite a slate of customers, partners, an industry observer and EDA’s premier investor to talk about the value SpyGlass brings to each of their realms. It’ll be interesting to hear how this signature product has proliferated in different environments! Atrenta invites you to stop by and hear how SpyGlass improves productivity @ Xilinx, Vivante, Sonics and Arteris and why Dan Nenni and Jim Hogan see SpyGlass as the consummate ubiquitous product in EDA. The talks will be held at Atrenta’s booth #2230. Monday, June 4 9:30 am…..Jack Browne, Sonics Tuesday, June 5 10:30 am…Charlie Janac, Arteris Wednesday, June 6 10:30 am…Charlie Janac, Arteris ………………………. Hogan & McLellan….show you the moneyFriday, May 27th, 2011How are you going to
Get the answers from noted EDA & IP investor Jim Hogan and Paul McLellan – industry pundit and editor-in-chief of DAC Knowledge Center – as they define the new path to prosperity in EDA & IP. Jim and Paul will give a short presentation and steer an audience-oriented discussion on what direction startups and established companies in the EDA & IP space ought to steer if they want to show their investors the money. What direction? SOC Realization…no longer just a vision. It’s the sweet spot in EDA & IP – where to invest and where to anchor your EDA/IP startup. So if you are contemplating starting up or re-igniting a company in the EDA & IP space, this session will help you think about how your technology will analyze and verify design concepts much earlier in the design process…at much higher levels of abstraction than before. Where’s the opportunity? SoC Realization as a cockpit to guide a design from concept to implementation, ensuring that the design is synchronized for both the hardware and software aspects of the system’s functionality. When: Monday, June 6, 10-11am Where: DAC, Room 24A Please RSVP: Liz Massingill, liz@leepr.com For more information, contact Liz @ 831-345-4702
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Show me the moneyMonday, May 16th, 2011
Jim Hogan & Paul McLellan challenge the EDA industry to……
on DAC Free Monday
I’m jumping up & down with excitement? Are you? Then see details below…..
Who: Noted EDA & IP investor Jim Hogan and Paul McLellan – industry pundit and editor-in-chief of DAC Knowledge Center
What: Define the state and future of, and path to prosperity for EDA & IP industry. Format will be a short presentation, then audience-oriented discussion on what direction startups and established companies in the EDA & IP space ought to steer if they want to show their investors the money. Why: This session will help attendees think about how their companies’ technology will have to analyze and verify design concepts much earlier in the design process…at much higher levels of abstraction than before. That’s where the money in EDA & IP will be in the coming years. Hogan and McLellan will propose that EDA & IP companies will have to help users guide their SoC designs from concept to implementation, ensuring that the design is synchronized for both the hardware and software aspects of the system’s functionality. When: Monday, June 6, 10-11am Where: DAC, Room 24A Please RSVP: Liz Massingill, liz@leepr.com, Lee PR
For more information, contact Liz @ 831-345-4702
On Synopsys buying VirageSaturday, June 12th, 2010We asked three EDA figures to comment on how the Synopsys purchase of Virage would impact the EDA and IP industries. Here’s what they said. …………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Mike Gianfagna …………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Jim Hogan
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Synopsys has already been a formidable IP player and Cadence now entered it with its recent acquisition of Denali. There are still plenty of smaller IP players so we’ll see further consolidation playing out. The IP segment has been trying to define and position itself between EDA and semiconductors. We all wondered if IP would become an intrinsic part of the semiconductor industry, the EDA industry, or stand on its own. These days we clearly see that the IP pendulum has shifted toward EDA. The outlier is of course ARM which is a different beast, in some ways closer to semiconductors: i.e., look at how ARM competes with Intel. With a market cap equivalent to Synopsys and Cadence put together, ARM is simply too big for that. Coby Zelnik
– end – EDA SizzleMonday, March 1st, 2010
Jim and Paul made some very hard-hitting points in this valuable how-to workshop (at DVCon Tuesday night), one of which was emphasized by Leibson: “Sizzle is the highest leverage marketing point” said Hogan. Afterward, a couple of attendees shared with us that “there is no sizzle in EDA!” And “as we all know, many engineering driven startups (even some engineering driven mature companies) undervalue or don’t understand the importance of sizzle – a big mistake.” What is sizzle? How do you define it? Is there sizzle in EDA? Why or why not? Who has it, if there is sizzle in EDA? Let us know what you think…… ~Liz Massingill Harry’s Job as a blogger: Harry the ASIC Guy talks about his EDA roleMonday, January 11th, 2010(Liz Massingill concludes her conversation with Harry “the ASIC Guy” Gries)
Liz: What do you feel that your job is as a blogger? Harry: By “job”, do you mean “responsibility”? Liz: Responsibility or purpose. Harry: I wanted to make a distinction there because a lot of people view bloggers like the next generation of journalists. That’s not me. I don’t feel I have a responsibility to cover any one issue or to be non-biased. Liz: Well, no, you aren’t a reporter, but I would call you a commentator or columnist. Would you agree? Harry: I suppose, if a journalist is supposed to be totally objective and a commentator is allowed to have an opinion, then I’m more of a commentator. There’s been a lot written lately about bloggers vs. journalists and I’d rather stay out of all that argument. We’re different, period. Liz: So what is your responsibility or purpose or duty? Harry: I write the blog because I want to write and it gives me a unique connection to my audience. I can have this conversation, debate, commiserate, etc that I could not do otherwise. Liz: I get that. Harry: Ron Wilson had an interesting insight at DAC. Liz: What was Ron’s insight? Harry: He said that in the past, conferences were the way that engineers socialized and networked. Also, when EE Times or EDN came out, they’d stand around the coffee machine and talk about it. Now, this kind of interaction is happening online. As a blogger, I’m kind of like the instigator for those conversations. In fact, some of my best blogs were where I put out some idea, and the most interesting insights came from the comments. Liz: Kudos to you that you were able to elicit so many comments. That isn’t too far off from what we have tried to do with our blogfests and what we were trying to do with Jim Hogan’s presentation at ICCAD. We were trying to initiate a discussion. And this brings me to…..What do you want or not want from PR folks? Harry: I’ll tell you about someone in PR who I think does a good job working with bloggers. Liz: I’m all ears… Harry: First off, she follows my blog and follows me on Twitter, so she has an idea of what I write about and what I am interested in. Second, if there is some news or item she thinks I’d be interested in, she will email me or tweet me, but not a SPAM press release. She’ll say something like “I know you are interested in XYZ. We have an upcoming announcement regarding that, would you be interested in learning more.” Last, if I am interested, she’ll help me to know more about it, either through material or talking to someone at the company. Liz: That makes sense. I think it’s pretty clear that bloggers do not want press releases. Harry: It’s not that I don’t want press releases; it’s that they are 90% out of my area of interest. Hold on, lemme just take a quick look at my Inbox:….Ok, so the last 10 items I got either from PR people or thru EDA company mailing lists, are not my area of interest. That’s why SPAMming press releases doesn’t work. Liz: So what are your favorite topics in EDA? Harry: I look for something that will be disruptive because that interests me the most and generates the most interest. When the OVM/VMM battle was going on, that was a hot topic. When Oasys Design Systems claimed to have a Synopsys-killer synthesis tool, then that was interesting. Harry: Dog is barking at the UPS guy 🙂 Liz: I’m familiar with that scenario….esp. lately. 😉 So let’s talk about something controversial…. Harry: uh oh Liz: Jim Hogan insinuated during his ICCAD presentation that EDA is complacent. In your opinion, how complacent is EDA? Harry: I probably would not choose that word to describe EDA. I’d probably pick the word ‘angst” to describe EDA. In the last year we had a DVCon panel called “EDA: Dead or Alive”, we’ve had several companies go under or get bought, and we’ve had a lot of talk about new business models and where EDA provides value. I think EDA is struggling, like it always has, to find out where it fits in the design chain and the supply chain. So there is a lot of angst in that way. Liz: What do you think the trend will be for the next 10 years? Harry: 10 years is a long time, especially the way that technology is accelerating. I think that over such a long time, you need to look at the bigger trends going on overall, not just in EDA, and then see how EDA will need to respond. On the economic side, I think the entire IT and software world will change significantly. Cloud computing is a big buzz now but it is for real and companies are going to continually want to rent IT infrastructure rather than own it. Liz: EDA is driven by the Intels and AMDs of the world. Harry: Yes, and even Intel and AMD are embracing cloud computing even though they may stand to lose out in the short run. The economics are such that it is more advantageous to build a large data center somewhere that power and cooling are cheap rather than everyone have their own data centers. Companies, like Amazon, rent computing time for 10 cents per CPU hour; and that allows companies to make their IT costs into a running expense rather than a capital expenditure. I think that EDA will need to embrace cloud computing and eventually a Software-as-a-Service model. I think the technology trend will be that custom ICs will be too expensive to design. In 10 years you’ll have standard off-the-shelf ICs that have hundreds of processors and 10s of millions of gates of reprogrammable logic, like an FPGA on steroids. Most products will be designed with these, so today’s chip design will become tomorrow’s software development. – end – |
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This acquisition puts Synopsys squarely in the front of the pack as far as IP suppliers go. This trend could be quite significant. Successful IP reuse is a combination of the right EDA tools, best practices methodology and well-designed IP. The EDA vendor is a pretty good place for all that to come together. ARM remains the exception to this rule, and several other rules for that matter.
I don’t see how this doesn’t make Synopsys a competitor with ARM on physical IP and ARC processor. ARM should start feeling like it is getting surrounded by Synopsys.
With EDA trying to expand its scope and grow beyond its traditional boundaries (see EDA360), and with small and medium size IP vendors struggling to grow, basic economy forces are pushing this trend.
Steve Leibson in 
