Geoffrey Coram of Analog Devices Wins Si2 Pinnacle Award

Geoffrey Coram, staff CAD engineer at Analog Devices, has received the quarterly Silicon Integration Initiative Pinnacle Award, recognizing volunteers for their exceptional contributions to Si2’s success as a leading semiconductor research and development joint venture.

Coram serves as chair of three working groups within the Si2 Compact Model Coalition, which pools industry resources to fund the development of standard compact SPICE models and interfaces promoting simulation tool interoperability. In 2016, he was named CMC Technical Advisor for Verilog-A Code Quality. Coram has a long history with Verilog-A, having led the Accellera Verilog-AMS subcommittee’s work for adding compact modeling extensions in Language Reference Manual version 2.2, released in 2004.

He recently developed and released an open-source tool for checking Verilog-A models for common errors and performance issues in 2020. The tool, known as the Verilog-A Model Pythonic Rule Enforcer, or VAMPyRE, has seen rapid industry adoption since its launch. He also has reviewed the Verilog-A implementation of every CMC standard model. In 2020, Coram was recognized by the University of California at Berkeley’s BSIM model team as “Guardian of Verilog-A Compact Models for the Global Semiconductor Industry.”

“Geoffrey is an innovative voice within the CMC and has an excellent critical eye,” said John Ellis, president and CEO of Si2. “His work with VAMPyRE illustrates his longstanding commitment to efficiency and interoperability. We are fortunate to have him in leadership.”

Coram joined Analog Devices in 2000 and focuses on its internal circuit simulator and other internal CAD tools. He earned his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a thesis on thermodynamics and noise modeling in circuits.

Mark Rossman Elected Architect of SI2 OpenAccess Change Team

Mark Rossman, software engineering group director at Cadence Design Systems, is the new architect of the Si2 OpenAccess Change Team, the approving body for changes to the OpenAccess API and reference database implementation. He replaces Michaela Guiney, also from Cadence, who retired in December.

Rossman has spent over 40 years in electronic design automation, developing software algorithms for automatic routing and layout migration capabilities. During the past 20 years at Cadence, he developed routing flows and solution integration for the Virtuoso Platform and organized collaboration between internal groups and key external development partners.

Before the Virtuoso Platform development, he worked on the CCT Cadence Chip Assembly Router routing tools and Catena’s Space Based Routing Technologies. He has five patents granted for routing and layout migration algorithms.

Marshall Tiner, Si2 senior director of OpenAccess, said Rossman “brings extensive experience in routing, layout, and design rule technologies as well as large scale multi-threaded development and collaborative integration. His on-the-job experience with OpenAccess, brings an important perspective to the OpenAccess Coalition.”

About the Silicon Integration Initiative

Si2 is a leading R&D joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for IC design tools. Its primary programs include CMC and OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used open reference database for IC design, with a supporting standard APA. All Si2 activities are carried out under the auspices of the National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the fundamental law that defines R&D joint ventures and offers them a large measure of protection against federal antitrust laws.

Michaela Guiney Named Si2 Pinnacle Award Winner

Michaela Guiney, who recently retired after an 18-year career with Cadence Design Systems, has received the quarterly Silicon Integration Initiative Pinnacle Award, recognizing volunteers for their exceptional contributions to Si2’s success as a leading semiconductor research and development joint venture.

Guiney’s latest role at Cadence was senior software architect, working on IC custom design software, including Si2 OpenAccess, one of the industry’s most widely used databases.

She began her career at Hewlett Packard, working on EDA technology and tools for chip design. In 20 years at HP and later Agilent Technologies, she moved her way up the chip design chain, working on custom design and routing tools, a custom design system, and finally an overall chip implementation flow.

Guiney held both engineering and management positions at HP and Agilent. She came full circle when she joined Cadence in 2003 to return to her roots in EDA databases. She served as the co-chief architect of the OpenAccess Change Team until December 2021.

John Ellis, Si2 president and CEO, said Guiney “is of the many unsung heroes who have made OpenAccess the stable platform for EDA development applications the industry has come to rely on. Under her guidance, the Change Team shepherded OpenAccess through six major database revisions and over 100 releases.”

About the Silicon Integration Initiative

Si2 is a leading R&D joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for IC design tools. Its primary programs include CMC and OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used open reference database for IC design, with a supporting standard APA. All Si2 activities are carried out under the auspices of the National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the fundamental law that defines R&D joint ventures and offers them a large measure of protection against federal antitrust laws.

Si2 Reorganizes, Promotes Two Technologists to Bolster Semiconductor Interoperability Programs

Silicon Integration Initiative, a leading research and development joint venture, has promoted two technologists as part of a reorganization to strengthen semiconductor industry design flow interoperability among its member companies.

Leigh Anne Clevenger, formerly director of OpenStandards, was promoted to vice president of Technology, and Marshall Tiner, formerly director of Production Standards, to senior director of OpenAccess.

John Ellis, president and CEO, said “experts throughout the industry consider interoperability in semiconductor design a primary strategy to accelerate innovation and achieve faster time-to-results and time-to-market. With this reorganization, Si2 positions itself to advance its current interoperability activities and identify new opportunities. Leigh Anne and Marshall have the industry expertise and technical prowess to lead this move forward.”

Since joining Si2 in 2018, Clevenger has established and driven efforts to identify and solve industry needs in applying artificial intelligence and machine learning to electronic design automation tools. She spearheads the demonstration of the Unified Power Model/IEEE-2416 standard and has been the lead developer of the Si2 prototype power calculator. She will continue driving work in AI/ML and UPM in this new role while developing additional Si2 technical activities in interoperability through the new Si2 TITAN council.

Clevenger earned her doctorate at Pace University and has published and presented research on data science, including big data analytics, machine learning algorithms and wearable computing.

Tiner joined Si2 in 2015 after stints with Motorola and IBM, where his responsibilities included design, development, manufacturing, verification, test and management. His product development achievements range from microcontrollers to workstations and liquid-cooled mainframes computers. Tiner was a key contributor in developing one of the first event-based production VLSI test systems and managed the largest install-base in North America.

In his new position, Tiner oversees the development of OpenAccess, the Si2 flagship product and the semiconductor industry’s most widely used database and API for semiconductor design.

About Si2

Si2 is a leading research and development joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for IC design tools. Its primary products include OpenAccess, the most widely used, open reference database for IC design, and the Compact Model Coalition, which provides an avenue to fund standard compact SPICE models and standard interfaces for simulation tool interoperability. Si2 activities are carried out under the auspices of the National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the fundamental law that defines R&D joint ventures and offers them a large measure of protection against federal antitrust laws.

Anant Adke of Siemens EDA Joins Si2 Board of Directors

Anant Adke, vice president of Engineering, Siemens EDA, has been elected to the Silicon Integration Initiative board of directors. He replaces Juan Rey, who retired from Siemens EDA in December.

Adke manages the Siemens EDA—formerly Mentor Graphics—Calibre engineering group, which develops high-performance, compute-intensive software addressing the physical verification needs of the semiconductor industry’s leading-edge nodes. He joined Mentor in 1995. During his tenure at Calibre, Adke has managed engineering groups responsible for implementing interfaces to industry standard design creation tools and databases such as OpenAccess and represented Mentor Graphics on the OpenAccess Coalition.

“From its very inception, I have been a strong supporter of Si2’s mission of providing interoperability standards to drive EDA design tools and flows in addressing the needs of the IC industry,” Anant said. “I am excited to serve on the Si2 board and promote its efforts at fostering standards-led solutions to interoperability across the EDA industry”.

Anant holds a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, and a master’s degree in computer engineering from University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

“The addition of Anant continues the strong support Siemens EDA has provided Si2 over the years,” said John Ellis, Si2 president and CEO. “As a longstanding board member, Siemens EDA strongly supports tool interoperability and the value and cost-savings it provides for the industry. I look forward to Anant’s insights and contributions to the Si2 board.”

About Si2

Founded in 1988, Si2 is a leading research and development joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for integrated circuit design tools. All Si2 activities are carried out under the auspices of The National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the fundamental law that defines R&D joint ventures and offers them significant protections against federal antitrust laws. The Si2 international membership includes semiconductor foundries, fabless manufacturers, and EDA companies.

Colin Shaw of Silvaco Named Si2 Pinnacle Award Winner

Colin Shaw, senior corporate applications engineer at Silvaco, has received the quarterly Silicon Integration Initiative Pinnacle Award, recognizing volunteers for their exceptional contributions to Si2’s success as a leading semiconductor research and development joint venture.

A chartered engineer with over 30 years of semiconductor industry experience, Shaw serves as chair of six Si2 Compact Model Coalition working groups and vice-chair of three others. His expertise includes the production and development of device processes for silicon and II-V compounds, as well as device and circuit design covering test structures, SRAM, IGBT and SAW filters.

For 25 years, CMC has offered semiconductor manufacturers, designers, and simulation tool providers an avenue to collectively fund, develop and optimize standard compact SPICE models and interfaces to promote simulation tool interoperability. CMC funds and supports select university and national laboratory compact model developers to achieve these goals.

“Colin has been a driving force within CMC since its integration with Si2 in 2013,” said John Ellis, Si2 president and CEO. “From leading the working group that created an open, industry-standard model simulator interface, to chairing our two recent gallium nitride and silicon carbide efforts, he has been a consistent coalition leader and team player. This combination of vision and commitment makes Colin truly deserving of the Si2 Pinnacle Award.”

Shaw will present at the quarterly CMC meetings scheduled for December 7-10.

About the Silicon Integration Initiative

Si2 is a leading R&D joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for IC design tools. Its primary programs include CMC and OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used open reference database for IC design, with a supporting standard APA. All Si2 activities are carried out under the auspices of the National Cooperative Research and Production Act of 1993, the fundamental law that defines R&D joint ventures and offers them a large measure of protection against federal antitrust laws.

Si2 Launches TITAN Initiative Advancing Silicon-to-System Technology Interoperability

Plans to Address Challenges Posed by Duality of Moore’s Law and  More than Moore 3D-IC Trends in Vertical Markets

Silicon Integration Initiative has launched the Technology Interoperability Trajectory Advisory CouNcil, a thought leadership collaboration to drive industry growth in crucial vertical semiconductor markets.

TITAN will work with Si2 member companies to explore a spectrum of technology interoperability gaps between electronic design automation suppliers, cloud providers, foundries, semiconductor and emerging silicon-to-system companies. TITAN will generate consensus on technology interoperability in workflows and advise the Si2 board of directors on high-level trends and realizable solutions. In addition, TITAN will bridge established Si2 programs such as the OpenAccess, Compact Model and OpenStandards Coalitions, and Special Interest Groups.

TITAN founding members include Ansys, Arm, Cadence Design Systems, Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Qualcomm Technologies, Samsung Electronics, Siemens EDA, Silvaco, SK hynix and Synopsys.

John Ellis, Si2 president and CEO, said, “New capabilities empowered by AI, IoT, hyperscale computing, automotive and 5G/6G are driving the digital transformation toward a semiconductor industry renaissance. The complexity of designing and integrating these diverse technologies into current and future systems requires not only interoperability for multi-physical-domain system design software but also unambiguous means of securely controlling and sharing the private data required for implementing an efficient, connected and extensible environment.”

Vic Kulkarni, Si2 chief strategy officer, said, “Our industry ecosystem is transitioning workflows from the silicon-centric to the silicon-to-system-centric worlds. TITAN unites technology thought leaders to identify and address challenges in silicon-to-system design implementation, particularly in a cloud environment compatible with AI and ML in crucial vertical markets. The primary goal for TITAN is to accelerate innovation through industry collaboration to achieve faster time to results and time to market.

“TITAN will serve as the trusted technology advisor to the Si2 board of directors, which evaluates and forwards proposals to Si2 technology teams for prioritization and action plans. Council members will determine the best path forward for industry collaboration and commit resources to develop and prototype gap technologies,” Kulkarni added.

Kerim Kalafala, senior technical staff member at IBM Systems Group and TITAN interim chair, said, “I am looking forward to working with TITAN member companies to address the top priorities which were shared during the recent TITAN launch. These include the secure processed data SPEED API for cloud interoperability, high-level workflows for 2.5D/3D-IC advanced packaging, and challenges in EDA workflows for complex chip designs addressing the key vertical markets.”

TITAN participation is open to Si2 members. For more information, visit https://si2.org/TITAN, or contact Kulkarni at [email protected].

Joydip Das of Samsung Named Si2 Pinnacle Award Winner

Joydip Das, staff engineer at Samsung Austin Research & Development Center in Austin, Texas, has received the quarterly Silicon Integration Initiative Pinnacle Award. This award recognizes volunteers for their exceptional contributions to Si2’s success as a leading semiconductor R&D joint venture.

Das was selected for his contributions to the Si2 AI/ML in EDA Special Interest Group, which he chaired since its creation in October 2019. Under his guidance, the group wrote three white papers, conducted a successful industry survey, offered an AI/ML workshop with over 100 attendees, and delivered five conference papers.

“Joydip has proven to be an exceptional leader, forming subgroups to accomplish deliverables on topics of interest to our member companies. He encourages participation by professors and graduate students, helping the SIG recruit over 20 member companies and universities,” said Leigh Anne Clevenger, Si2 director of OpenStandards.”

Das earned his Ph.D. in Applied Science from the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of British Columbia (UBC), Vancouver, Canada. He has publications in peer-reviewed IEEE and ACM journals and conferences.

About the Silicon Integration Initiative

Si2 is a leading research and development joint venture that provides standard interoperability solutions for IC design tools. Its primary products include OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used, open-reference database for IC design, and the Compact Model Coalition, which provides an avenue to fund standard compact SPICE models and standard interfaces for simulation tool interoperability.

Authors of AI/ML White Paper Win Annual Si2 Power of Partnerships Award

Presentation set during Si2 Annual Technology Forum

Authors of a groundbreaking Silicon Integration Initiative white paper identifying a common data model as the most critical need to accelerate artificial intelligence and machine learning in semiconductor electronic design automation are winners of the 2021 Si2 Power of Partnerships Award.

The annual awards recognize the Si2 volunteer team that has made the most significant contributions to EDA innovation and efficiency. Si2 will present the awards at the Si2 Annual Technology Forum, Friday, August 6, 8:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time. Speakers will focus on semiconductor design-in-the-cloud strategies. The forum is open to the public and admission is free.

The white paper, produced by an Si2 Special Interest Group, reports on findings of a global survey that identifies planned usage and structural gaps for AI and ML in EDA. It is available for download at: https://si2.org/ai-ml-downloads/

Leigh Anne Clevenger, Si2 director of OpenStandards, said that the white paper identifies “a standard, common model for classifying and structuring machine learning and inference data as crucial to accelerating the use of AI/ML in EDA. This data model would provide a foundation for addressing the data organization gap for chip developers, EDA tool developers, IP providers, and researchers. It would support design data and derived data for high-interest use cases.”

The white paper also identified a common reference flow, online AI/ML courses and organized training data as industry needs.

“Brought together by their shared interest in artificial intelligence and machine learning, the authors shared their unique perspectives and experience to emphasize the importance of data to any ML solution for EDA,” Clevenger said.

Power of Partnerships winners for 2021 are:

  • Kerim Kalafala, IBM, Chair
  • Veeravanallur Parthasarathy, Advanced Micro Devices
  • Norman Chang, Ansys
  • Akhilesh Kumar, Ansys
  • Elias Fallon, Cadence Design Systems
  • Sriram Madhavan, GLOBALFOUNDRIES
  • Prateek Bhansali, Intel
  • Srinivas Bodapati, Intel
  • Chandramouli Kashyap, Intel
  • James Masters, Intel
  • Ramy Iskander, Intento Design
  • Larg Weiland, PDF Solutions
  • Karthik Aadithya, Sandia National Laboratory
  • Boon-Siang Cheah, Synopsys
  • Mengdi He, Synopsys

Based on member and officer recommendations, Si2 executives submit nominations for the Power of Partnerships Award from which the Si2 board of directors then selects the winners.

Runners-up for 2021 are:

Compact Model Coalition, Open Model Interface Working Group
Colin Shaw, Chair, Silvaco

Contributed to Si2 initially by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, OMI is built around the TSMC Model Interface. OMI allows circuit designers to simulate and analyze such significant physical effects as self-heating and aging, and to perform extended design optimizations, including statistical modeling of process variations.

OpenAccess Coalition, Polygon Operators Working Group
James Masters, Chair, Intel

The Polygon Operators Working Group develops oaxPop, an API extension used with Si2 OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used open reference database for IC design. Originally contributed to Si2 by Intel, oaxPop brings the power of the popular Boost Polygon Library into the expanding OpenAccess design database ecosystem.

Hongmei Li Named IBM Representative to Si2 OpenAccess Coalition

Hongmei Li is the new IBM representative to the Si2 OpenAccess Coalition.  Li currently manages the Product Design Enablement Group in the IBM electronic design automation organization. She replaces Paul Stabler, a long-time supporter of OpenAccess activities, who is retiring from IBM.

Over her 17-year IBM career, Li has worked on radio-frequency MOSFET and passive device models, gate resistance characterization, de-embedding methodology for RF measurement, FET local layout effect, 3D through-silicon-via stress modeling, test site macro design and test site coordination. Starting August 1, she will manage the EDA Technology Enablement & ChipBench Group.

Li received a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana in 2004.

Si2 OpenAccess, the world’s most widely used, open-reference database for IC design, creates authentic interoperability between EDA companies and semiconductor designers and manufacturers.