Library Characterization

SiliconSmart and QuickCap are industry-standard library characterization and extraction solutions that ensure silicon predictability and improve designer productivity

Library developers, IP vendors and COT design teams rely on abstract models to accurately represent the electrical behavior of circuits implemented with advanced process technologies. To meet the needs of these customers, the SiliconSmart product suite characterizes standard cells, I/O cells and embedded memories to provide robust timing, low-power, signal integrity and design for manufacturability (DFM) models in a variety of industry-standard formats. SiliconSmart offers accuracy, high throughput, support for a comprehensive range of standard formats and ease of use. When used with popular implementation and verification tools, these models offer silicon predictability and improved designer productivity. As a result, SiliconSmart models help customers shorten design cycles and improve chip performance.

The SiliconSmart base product and extensions include:

• SiliconSmart® ACE provides standard-cell, I/O, custom macro, and memory characterization and modeling for all popular design flows. It supports all the advanced timing, power, noise and statistical modeling. The proprietary Accelerated Circuit Engine (ACE) fully automates the characterization flow. By embedding Magma's FineSim SPICE simulator, SiliconSmart ACE provides an order-of-magnitude improvement in throughput.
• SiliconSmart DFM enables designers to tackle both systematic and random process variations. By reducing reliance on guard-banding techniques such as on-chip variation and by guiding the selection of higher-yielding cells, SiliconSmart DFM allows designers to increase yield.
• SiliconSmart Sign-Off provides the advanced modeling constructs required for timing, power and noise analysis and repair flows.
• SiliconSmart ACE Memory Characterization enables the characterization and modeling of memory instances with complete simulation-based accuracy and unprecedented throughput by leveraging Magma’s accurate, high-capacity and ultra-fast FineSim Pro simulator.
  

As geometries shrink and clock frequencies increase, designers need more accurate parasitic values to adequately predict timing and noise to avoid excessive design margins and failed chips. The growing need for more accuracy makes it increasingly necessary to account for precise fringing electrostatic fields and process effects in test structures and analyzing critical cells, blocks and nets. Conventional 3D field solvers don’t provide robust, consistent, accurate capacitance values for actual designs, nor do they have sufficient capacity to handle moderately sized blocks or long critical nets. QuickCap products provide accurate 3D extraction that precisely models advanced process effects.

The QuickCap product line includes:

• QuickCap is the gold-standard 3D capacitance extractor for integrated circuits.
• QuickCap NX is the next-generation 3D parasitic extractor for circuit analysis. QuickCap NX includes advanced process modeling, technology model encryption, a parallel execution mode, reference-level SPICE netlist generation and reduction, and a new 3D graphics viewer.