Article Roundup: Software in System-Level Verification, Automotive ECU Safety, Silicon Photonics Design, IC Process Corners & Starblaze’s Simulation-Emulation Strategy
- Is Software Necessary?
- Fuzzing on Automotive Security
- Crossing the Wires of Electronics and Photonics
- Process Corner Explosion
- How Starblaze combined simulation and emulation to design SSD controller firmware
Is Software Necessary?
SemiEngineering
System-level verification is gaining increased focus due to the proliferation of larger and more complex system designs. Software is an integral piece of system-level verification, but not all of the software-hardware transactions that occur are important. This article examines the role of software in verification, how much may be required, and related challenges.
Fuzzing on Automotive Security
SemiWiki
Automotive electronic control units (ECUs) control everything from air conditioning to safety-critical steering and braking systems. This has prompted new and more rigorous safety guidelines, such as ISO 26262, that require extensive testing and documentation for these components. This article describes new testing and verification technologies that enable streamlined fault injection, debug, and more to help ensure the safety and reliability of automotive ECUs.
Crossing the Wires of Electronics and Photonics
Electronic Design
Conventional silicon photonics design methods are slow and require deep, expert-level knowledge of electronics and photonics. This contributes to the incredible, and sometimes prohibitive, cost of integrating photonic circuitry into electronic devices. Now, however, a new solution can automatically integrate photonic and electrical components onto the same layout, reducing redesign time from weeks to minutes.
Process Corner Explosion
SemiEngineering
SoC design teams seek to increase the predictability of manufacturing results by modeling boundary conditions before committing to silicon. At 7nm process nodes and below, however, this modeling is providing more and more potential variations making it difficult to extract actionable intelligence. In some cases, complete coverage requires as many as sixty simulations, which necessitates significant time and resource investment.
How Starblaze combined simulation and emulation to design SSD controller firmware
Tech Design Forum
Starblaze, a Beijing-based fabless startup, used a simultaneous simulation and emulation verification flow to verify their SSD controller design. With this flow in place, Starblaze was able to tape out its first prototype in just six months, and its first production chip in under two years. This article recaps a conversation between Lauro Rizzatti and Bruce Cheng, Starblaze’s chief ASIC architect.
