Posts Tagged ‘TSMC’
Thursday, October 5th, 2017
Hangzhou C-SKY Microsystems, a 32-bit CPU vendor, became a member of the ESD Alliance in 2016 and was described at the time as “the first IP company from China to join.”
Founded in 2001, C-Sky has “developed 7 types of embedded CPUs covering a wide range of embedded applications including smart devices in IoT, digital audio and video, information security, network and communications, industrial control and automotive electronics. It is the only embedded CPU volume provider in China with its own instruction set architecture, the Yun-on-Chip architecture developed in conjunction with Alibaba.”
C-Sky is a growing IP company serving an enormous market. I spoke recently by phone with Dr. Xiaoning Qi, CEO at C-Sky, who was in California attending meetings. No stranger to Silicon Valley, he previously served at Intel, Rambus, Synopsys, and Sun, after completing his Ph.D. under Prof. Robert Dutton at Stanford.
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Tags: Aart de Geus, Alibaba, ARM, Asia-Pacific Leadership Council, Bob Smith, C-Sky Microsystem Corp., Chenming Hu, Chi-Foon Chan, Chinese American Semiconductor Professional Association, ESD Alliance, GSA, IEEE, Intel, Mentor Graphics, Microsoft, NB-IoT, Rambus, Robert Dutton, SMIC, Stanford, Subhasish Mitra, Sun Microsystems, Synopsys, TSMC, Wally Rhines, Xiaoning Qi, ZTE
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Thursday, September 28th, 2017
Sage Design Automation offers iDRM – integrated design rule management – a “true design rule compiler that enables quick graphical capturing of design rules and uses them as executable expressions for Specification, Communication, Validation, DRC, Analysis, Deck validation and coverage, and DRC deck generation.”
But this is not about Sage, it’s about how Sage fits into an evolving industry from the point of view of Raul Camposano, EDA veteran, former CTO at Synopsys, and currently CEO at Sage. Like so many serving in leadership roles in the industry, Dr. Camposano is a man of good cheer and an optimistic observer.
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Tags: Dan Nenni, DRC decks, ESD Alliance, Giovanni De Micheli, IoT, Kurt Keutzer, Mead Conway, Mentor Graphics, Moore's Law, Raul Camposano, Sage, Silicon Catalyst, Synopsys, TSMC
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Thursday, May 4th, 2017
It’s not been pretty of late in the world of IP. Imagination’s valuation tanked when it was revealed in early April that the company might be losing Apple as a customer. Imagination says it’s going to fight this development, but a different ending to the story of David and Goliath comes to mind in that declaration.
Then this week, that same Imagination announced it was selling MIPS – a company it bought back in 2012 with great fanfare for [a mere] $60 million. [It’s true, MIPS’ patent portfolio was worth a lot more.]
Also this week, TSMC announced it is charging a former employee with IP theft: The former employee is alleged to have stolen manufacturing data from TSMC specifically related to Nvidia and AMD chip production, taken it across the Straights of Taiwan, and turned it over to his new employer in the PRC, HLMC.
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Tags: AMD, Apple, HLMC, Imagination, MIPS, NVIDIA, TSMC
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Wednesday, December 14th, 2016
Flex Logic announced some astonishing news this week – the completed design of a “high-performance IP core for TSMC 16FF+ and 16FFC, with performance for wide, single-stage logic around ~1GHz at worst case PVT conditions.”
In a phone call to discuss the announcement, Flex Logic CEO and Co-founder Geoff Tate was clearly ebullient: “Last August we were talking about TSMC’s 40-nanometer ULP, ultra low power, and now this week we’re talking about the first 16-nanometer finFET plus.
“This one, our EFLX 100, is like the one we announced at 40 nanometers – but at 16 nanometers it will run much faster!
“We’ve done extensive measurements [to confirm] for many applications that these cores will run at 1GHz or faster, even in worst-case temperature conditions.”
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Tags: EFLX-100 cores, embedded FPGA, Flex Logic, Geoff Tate, TSMC, TSMC 16FF+
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Wednesday, August 12th, 2015
Autumn used to start in September, but now classes and conferences commence in August and vacation ends just that much sooner. Here’s a list of various events you should consider attending between now and the end of the year, with thanks to conference organizers for the associated descriptions.
Scanning the range of topics, it’s clear the combined IP and EDA industries have an increasingly broad range of interests: IoT, autos, wearables, software security, verifying/integrating IP, power, device physics, memory, embedded processors and software, sensors, MEMS, a range of standards, networking, both the professional and technical kinds, and “synergistic collaborative design” both up in the cloud and down below on solid ground.
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Tags: 3D ASIP, Aart de Geus, ARC Processor Summit 2015, ARM, ARM TechCon 2015, Autonomous Cars 2015, Cadence, CDNLive, Connect Security World, DVCon Europe, DVCon India, GlobalFoundries, ICCAD 2015, IEDM 2015, Intel Developer Forum, MemCon 2015, Mentor Graphics, Mentor Graphics Forum, PCB West 2015, Si2Con, SMIC, Synopsys, TSMC, TSMC 2015 OIP Ecosystem Forum, Wally Rhines, Wearable Technology Conference
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Thursday, October 2nd, 2014
This blog requires a long, tall cup of coffee: Go get one, put your feet up, and plow on through. ARM TechCon 2014 took place this week at the Santa Clara Convention Center, and as an indication of what the industry feels is important right now, the following is a complex snapshot of press releases issued by various TechCon exhibitors highlighting their progress in the days leading up to and including the show. Listed first are the three main ARM press releases, then the other exhibitors are showcased.
By the way, the answer to what the industry thinks is important today? If the following is any indication, it’s IoT all the way down, with a dollop of FinFET and low-power thrown in for good measure. And if you don’t know IoT means Internet of Things, you haven’t been listening – particularly as Freescale says in their Press Release: “Analyst research firm Gartner estimates that the IoT will include 26 billion units installed by 2020, and by that time, IoT product and service suppliers will generate incremental revenue exceeding $300 billion, mostly in services.”
Another possible conclusion from the following: If you’re still holding out hope the Design Automation Conference is anchor tenant of the conference year, you should let that go. The amount of news these companies are releasing around ARM TechCon far out weighs what they’re releasing around DAC.
** ARM announced on October 1st “two new physical IP implementation solutions for its silicon partners to help simplify the path to implementation for their FinFET physical designs. ARM Artisan Power Grid Architect will reduce overall design time by creating optimal SoC power grid layouts, while ARM Artisan Signoff Architect increases accuracy and precision in managing on-chip variation over existing methodologies. These new physical IP implementation solutions strengthen the commitment from ARM to enable delivery of real silicon with the speed consumers are demanding.”
** ARM announced on October 1st, mbed OS, a free operating system for ARM Cortex-M processor based devices that consolidates the fundamental building blocks of the IoT in one integrated set of software components; mbed Device Server, a licensable software product that provides the required server-side technologies to connect and manage devices in a secure way, that also provides a bridge between the protocols designed for use on IoT devices and the APIs that are used by web developers; and mbed.org, the focus point for a community of more than 70,000 developers around mbed. The website provides a comprehensive database of hardware development kits, a repository for reusable software components, reference applications, documentation and web-based development tools.
** ARM and TSMC announced on October 2nd a new multi-year agreement that will deliver up ARMv8-A processor IP optimized for TSMC 10FinFET process technology. Per the Press Release: “Because of the success in scaling from 20SoC to 16FinFET, ARM and TSMC have decided to collaborate again for 10FinFET. This early path-finding work will provide valuable learning to enable physical design IP and methodologies in support of customers to tape-out 10FinFET designs as early as Q4 2015.”
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Tags: Acacia Communications, Airbus Defence and Space, Aldec, Altium Ltd., AMD, ANSYS, AppliedMicro, ARicent, ARM, ARM TechCon 2014, Arteris, ASSET InterTech, Atmel, Avago Technologies, Aviva Energy Corp., Cadence, Carbon Design Systems, Cavium, Cisco, Codasip, Doulos, Esterel, Express Logic, FreeBSD Foundation, Freescale, Gartner, GlobalFoundries, Green Hills Software, HP, IAR Systems, Intel, Internet of Things, IPSO Alliance, Lauterbach, LogMeIn, Mentor Graphics, Micrium, MontaVista Software, Mouser Electronics, Open-Silicon, P&E Microcomputer Systems, Rambus, Real Intent, Renesas Electronics, S2C, Samsung Electronics, SatixFy Ltd., SeeControl, SEGGER, Si2, SOMNIUM Technologies, Sonics, Spansion, STMicro, Synopsys, SYSGO, Teledyne LeCroy, TI, Toradex, TSMC, Undo Software, Uniquify, VanGogh Imaging, Vector Software, Wind River, Xilinx, XMOS, Zebra Technologies, Zuse Institute Berlin
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Monday, July 28th, 2014
There are three kinds of written word in the world today: books, newspapers/magazines, and all of the rest of it which now lives on the shifting sands of an ever-evolving electronic substrate. Even today, however, even as those ‘effervescent electrons’ garner more and more readers, it’s books-on-paper that continue to hold the most caché, the most gravitas-laden sense of permanence, and the most awe-inspring-for-the-ages kind of wow factor: Really? You wrote a book? Wow!
Hence, when a 220-page book-on-paper called Fabless: The Transformation of the Semiconductor Industry was made available to the EDA community at the 51st annual Design Automation Conference this past month in San Francisco, it was worth noting for several reasons: For the gravitas of the offering; For the permanence of the tome; And for the price, which thanks to eSilicon Corp. was free to all for the taking.
Written by SemiWiki.com gurus Daniel Nenni and Paul McLellan, this Fabulous Fabless book-on-paper was handed out during a buzzy networking event on the spacious East Side of Moscone Center early one evening during the week of DAC in June. At that noisy, ebullient reception, the libations were flowing liberally and so was the printed word.
Anyone milling about in the crowd quickly became the proud owner of Nenni/McLellan’s cheery, well-written history of the world – that special world consisting of everything termed “technology” since 1947 – and could even get signed copies, if they were able to elbow their way across the room to where the authors were perched side-by-side at a table with the express purpose of applying ink-to-paper on the front piece of their book.
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Tags: Altera, AMD, Apple, ARM, Arteris, Atrenta, C&T, Cadence, Calypto, CEVA, Chartered, Cliosoft, Coventer, Daniel Nenni, Docea, eSilicon, Fabless Semiconductor, GlobalFoundries, GSA, Imagination Technologies, Intel, Jasper, Mentor, Paul McLellan, SemiWiki.com, Sidense, Silvaco, Solido, Sonics, Synopsys, Tanner, TSMC, UMC, VLSI Technology, Xilinx
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Thursday, May 22nd, 2014
It’s just amazing that DAC has become so thoroughly a show about IP that there are two major parties happening in San Francisco in June that have IP in their name: HOT IP Party and Stars of IP Party.
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Tags: AdaptIP, ARM, Atrenta, Cadence, CAST, Certus, DAC 2014, Dassault Systemes, Denali, Design Automation Conference, HOT IP Party, IPextreme, Jim Hogan, Rambus, Semico, SFCASA, Sonics, Stars of IP Party, Synopsys, TrueCircuits, TSMC, Warren Savage
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Thursday, March 20th, 2014
Thanks to a lot of hard work and perseverance on the part of various thought leaders in the IP industry – folks like Mike McNamara, Warren Savage, McKenzie Mortensen, Clark Chen, Devin Persaud, Tiffany Sparks, Yervant Zorian, and Farzad Zarrinfar – at last, IP has become an anchor tenant at DAC.
A situation that’s been far too long in coming, given that these days there are approximately 30 companies in the EDA industry, but upwards of 500 in IP. The fact is, if DAC didn’t make itself available to showcase an industry with 10x more possible exhibitors than EDA, where’s the future of the conference anyway?
I had a chance to speak with ‘Mac’ McNamara on Tuesday of this week about the IP Initiative he’s heading up for DAC 2014. [The others on the list above are on the committee.] Mac’s a legend in the EDA community based on his expertise and leadership roles at Chronologic, SureFire, Verisity and Cadence, where he headed up the company’s C-to-Silicon Compiler and Virtual Systems Platform. Mac left Cadence in 2012, and has served since then as CEO of Adapt IP, an IP startup that boasts both John Sanguinetti and Lucio Lanza on its board.
During our conversation, Mac said that anyone planning on attending the Design Automation Conference this June in San Francisco will want to be there on Monday, June 2nd. That is, anyone who’s interested in the IP industry.
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Tags: Adapt IP, ARM, Cadence, Chronologic, Clark Chen, DAC 2014, Design Automation Conference, Devin Persaud, Farzad Zarrinfar, Global World Congress, Hot Chips, Houssein Yassaie, Imagination Technologies, IPextreme, John Sanguinetti, Lucio Lanza, McKenzie Mortensen, Mentor Graphics, Mike McNamara, SureFire, Synopsys, Tiffany Sparks, TSMC, Verisity, Warren Savage, Yervant Zorian
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Thursday, December 19th, 2013
This has been a complex year. Some stories were ferocious: the unspeakable double punch of earthquake and typhoon in the Philippines; the ongoing civil war in Syria; the Snowden/NSA revelations; the military coup in Egypt; the Boston Marathon bombings; the shopping mall attack in Nairobi; the shootings at the Washington Navy Yard; the discovery of kidnapping victims in Cleveland. Some stories were about historic change: a new pope; the death of Nelson Mandela; a choppy roll-out for the Affordable Healthcare Act.
Some stories were about trends: a decrease in unemployment; an increase in the financial markets; a marked uptick in housing values; the majority now carrying smart phones. Some stories were about SIP: Synopsys let loose a slew of IP-related press releases; Cadence acquired Tensilica and did the same; TSMC continued to portray itself as a foundry that just happens to have 3000+ IP cores in its arsenal; ARM remained the 800-pound gorilla.
Some stories were about EDA: Mentor talked non-stop about customers in the transportation sector and out-performed the Nasdaq, Dow, S&P500, CDNS and SNPS. FinFETs were all the rage, players big and small declared their readiness to embrace the technology, and Berkeley Prof. Chenming Hu accepted the Phil Kaufman Award. DAC celebrated 50 years and moved to Austin. EDAC had a party, celebrated EDA’s golden anniversary, and helped prepare a place of honor for design automation in the Computer History Museum. The industry sent a collective shout-out to Gary Smith.
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Tags: Ann Mutschler, ARM, Brian Bailey, Brian Fuller, Cadence, Chenming Hu, Computer History Museum, Ed Sperling, EDA, EDAC, FinFETs, Gabe Moretti, Gary Smith, Jeff Chappell, Katherine Derbyshire, Life of Pi, Mark LaPedus, Mentor Graphics, Synopsys, TSMC
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