Extreme DA and UMC Collaborate
The flows aim to accelerate time-to-manufacturing and reduce design uncertainty by focusing on design-for-manufacturing (DFM) issues such as timing and power variability prediction and optimisation in the presence of process variations. The first flow, based on Extreme DA's production-ready Extreme XT sign-off tools, has already been applied to a UMC test-chip at UMC's 90-nm process node.
The partnership between Extreme DA and UMC focuses on 65-nm design flow development, including:
-- Design of test structures for collecting specific process variation data
-- Extraction of pure random, spatially-correlated random, die-to-die random, and systematic variations in the front- and back-end processes
-- Silicon verification of XT's statistical timing and extraction results.
Using Extreme XT's statistical extraction and timing tools will allow mutual customers to utilise this unique variation-aware sign-off capability on UMC's proven 65-nm process, enabling improved parametric yield, reduced pessimism, and robust design capabilities.
" Our collaboration with Extreme DA has produced very encouraging results. We look forward to offering the benefits of these design flows to our 90-nm and 65-nm customers in the near future." said Patrick T. Lin, chief SOC architect at UMC.
Extreme DA CEO, Mustafa Celik, said, "It has been a pleasure to work closely with one of the world's top foundries to develop these variation-aware design and sign-off flows for advanced systems-on-chips (SoCs). We expect that they will satisfy the fabless semiconductor companies' demands for faster, more accurate timing closure and higher chip yields."
