Accelerated Safety Assurance with Questa One Functional Safety Solution

In an increasingly digital world, the safety and reliability of electronic systems are no longer optional, they are essential. Whether we’re talking about the circuitry in modern cars, life-saving medical devices, or complex industrial automation systems, the need for robust functional safety methodologies is greater than ever.

The Multi-Layered Challenge of Functional Safety

The journey towards ISO 26262 functional safety assurance is not simple. Engineers and organizations must address systematic failures, those introduced during the design and development process, and random failures, which occur during real-world system operation. The challenges and regulatory landscape is also evolving, as industries must keep pace with innovation including the infusion of AI, the trend towards multi-die and heterogeneous architectures, and the shift to software-defined vehicles.

Traditional verification methods, though robust in their time, often cannot meet the demands of today’s highly complex, connected, and autonomous systems. Recent data is a quite alarming suggesting that only 14% of silicon programs achieve first-pass success.

Simultaneously, there is a growing gap in the workforce required to deliver silicon on schedule and at cost.

Check out Harry’s blog post and whitepaper discussing the Verification Productivity gap 2.0.

Bottom line: teams need smarter, faster, and more integrated front-end verification approaches to deliver bug free, defect free, safe silicon. The remainder of this post will touch on key aspects of the new Questa One Functional Safety solution, and resources to help your team evolve and mature safety processes.

A look inside the Questa One Functional Safety solution

Questa One’s scalable, data-driven, and connected suite of capabilities accelerate functional safety tasks to deliver systematic, auditable compliance. Instead of piecing together a patchwork of disconnected tools, the industry now benefits from an optimized and streamlined process. This integrated approach saves valuable time and dramatically reduces the risk of critical gaps at every stage.

Let’s touch on a few key aspects below but if you want to dive deep immediately, the Questa One Functional Safety Solution whitepaper is a great starting point.

Smart, AI-Powered Verification

Questa One’s verification engines leverage artificial intelligence to supercharge traditional approaches. By utilizing AI and machine learning, the platform can identify potential failure patterns early, optimize the scope of testing, and dramatically improve the speed and thoroughness of the verification cycle. This smart verification allows teams to prevent systematic failures before they become systemic issues in deployed products.

Requirements-Driven Assurance

A central pillar of Questa One is requirements-driven verification. The Questa One Verification IQ platform ensures every requirement traces through the entire design and verification process, delivering dynamic and real-time traceability to requirement management systems. Traceability views and linking facilitate change impact analysis and quick navigation from requirements to verification artifacts.

Comprehensive Coverage Analysis

Closing the “last mile of coverage” is a common industry challenge, magnified in safety critical markets given the higher coverage bar teams must reach. Functional and structural coverage-driven verification is a cornerstone of Questa One. The Questa One VIQ platform AI infused data analytics capabilities accelerates closure across coverage analysis and debug, regression management, testplan authoring, and more. It’s web-based collaborative environment synchronizes domains (design, verification, etc…) and geographically diverse teams.

Design for Testability and Metastability Analysis

This Siemens solution doesn’t stop at traditional functional verification. It incorporates cutting-edge DFT-aware features to remove DFT verification as a potential tapeout bottleneck. Included within the Questa One DFT Verification solution is metastability analysis, the next generation of GLS simulation performance for pattern generation, a single scalable platform for logic and fault sim (fault grading), and more.

Advanced Safety Analysis with FMEDA

Questa One also supports advanced safety analysis, including Failure Modes, Effects, and Diagnostic Analysis (FMEDA). Questa One Safety Analyzer’s architectural analysis ensures that the safety strategy is viable early in the lifecycle. RTL and gate-level structural analysis capabilities provides further refinement and helps project teams identify vulnerabilities long before implementation is locked down.

Fault Campaign Management

Questa One Sim FX and SFV, combined with Tessent Defectsim and Veloce Fault App, deliver an evolution in fault campaign management and execution, bringing together simulation, emulation, and formal engines into a cohesive and efficient campaign execution.

A comprehensive suite of fault list optimization features streamlines engine execution and allows teams to accelerate closure. The functional safety database delivers seamless integration from fault list creation through fault engine execution, and the back-annotation of fault campaign results to safety work products such as FMEDA.

Tool Assessment and Qualification

Compliance requires that each tool used in the development of silicon is evaluated for its potential to introduce failures in the end product. Each tool within the Questa One umbrella is independently analyzed, audited, and certified by TuV-Saar. The safety manual and certification reports are available for inclusion into the larger safety case.

Conclusion

The “Accelerated Assurance with Questa One Functional Safety” whitepaper outlines how Siemens has reimagined the safety compliance journey. By combining AI-powered smart verification, comprehensive requirement tracing, powerful safety analysis tools, and best-in-class coverage and fault campaign management, Questa One offers organizations a holistic safety solution fit for the age of complexity and autonomy.

With Questa One, teams can accelerate their safety lifecycle, reduce cost in achieving safety compliance, and ultimately deliver safer, more reliable electronic systems.