ATopTech Place and Route included in TSMC 20nm Reference Flow

[daniel_payne]

The Place and Route marketplace is usually served by the big three: Synopsys, Cadence, Mentor

Upstart ATopTech continues to make inroads in P&R with the latest news that Apris and Apogee tools are included in the TSMC 20nm reference flow.

Some may say that a financial challenge for ATopTech is selling their point tools to customers that can get a better bundle deal with the big three in EDA, however this company is growing market share because their tools are really solving the 20nm issues (DPT and color-awareness). ATopTech even beat Mentor Graphics (Olympus) to the 20nm TSMC reference flow for Place & Route.

--- Press Release ---

SANTA CLARA, CA - October 10, 2012 - ATopTech, the leader in next generation
physical design solutions, today announced that Aprisa
<ATopTech Aprisa> (tm) and Apogee
<ATopTech Apogee> TM, the company's place and route solution,
are included in TSMC'S 20nm Reference Flow. TSMC'S 20nm process technology
delivers better performance and lower power consumption than previous
generations. TSMC and ATopTech collaborated in incorporating ATopTech tools
in the 20nm Reference Flow to address the increasing design challenges for
20nm.


Many new technologies have been developed in Aprisa and Apogee to enable
customer design successes at 20nm:


* Double patterning technology (DPT) routing rule support
* Color-aware routing
* Hierarchical design flow for DPT routing
* Vt-min width compliance
* GDS voltage marker for spacing check
* TCD/ICOVL insertion
* Boundary cell insertion






"AtopTech's P&R technology is architected specifically for advanced
technology design," said Jue-Hsien Chern, CEO of ATopTech. "We have worked
closely with TSMC to develop enhancements to ensure the highest possible
routability for optimal manufacturing for 20nm designs. The adoption from
TSMC's 20nm Reference Flow continues our mission to provide customers with
best in class physical design tools for advanced processes."






"We are pleased to include ATopTech's Aprisa P&R tool into the TSMC 20nm
Reference Flow," said Suk Lee, TSMC Senior Director, Design Infrastructure
Marketing Division. "The close collaboration between ATopTech and TSMC will
help enable successful 20nm projects for our joint customers."






About Aprisa


Aprisa is a complete place-and-route (P&R engine), including placement,
clock tree synthesis, optimization, global routing and detailed routing. The
core of the technology is its hierarchical database. Built upon the
hierarchical database are common "analysis engines", such as RC extraction,
design rule checking (DRC) engine, and an advanced, extremely fast timing
engine to solve the complex timing issues associated with OCV, signal
integrity (SI) and multi-corner multi-mode (MCMM) analysis. Aprisa uses
state-of-the-art multi-threading and distributed processing technology to
further speed up the process. Because of this advanced architecture, Aprisa
is able to deliver predictability and consistency throughout the flow, and
hence faster total turn-around time (TAT) and best quality of results (QoR)
for physical design projects.


About Apogee


Apogee is a full-featured top-level physical implementation tool that
includes proto-typing, floor-planning, and chip-assembly. The unified
hierarchical database enables a much more stream-lined hierarchical design
flow. Unique In-Hierarchy-Optimization (iHO) technology helps to close
top-level timing during Chip-Assembly through simultaneous optimization at
top-level and at blocks, reducing the turn-around time for top-level timing
closure from weeks to days.


About ATopTech


ATopTech, Inc. is the technology leader in IC physical design. ATopTech's
technology offers the fastest time to design closure focused on advanced
technology nodes. The use of state-of-the-art multi-threading and
distributed processing technologies speeds up the design process, resulting
in unsurpassed project completion times. For more information, see
www.atoptech.com


# # #


Aprisa and Apogee are trademarks and ATopTech is a registered trademark of
ATopTech, Inc. Any other trademarks or trade names mentioned are the
property of their respective owners.






Editorial Contact:


Michelle Clancy, Cayenne Communication LLC -- 252-940-0981,
michelle.clancy@cayennecom