 | Lauro Rizzatti General Manager of EVE-USA |
I recently came across this quote from Robert Noyce: “Optimism is an essential ingredient for innovation. How else can the individual welcome change over security, adventure over staying in safe places?”
Noyce knew a thing or two about innovation and the alchemy to create it. The “Mayor of Silicon Valley” co-founded Fairchild Semiconductor and Intel, and is credited, along with Jack Kilby, with inventing the integrated circuit. He had both an impressive career and an impressive grasp on innovation.
Armed with this quote, Bob Noyce as a role model and a bit of innovative thinking, I went looking for innovation in EDA. I’m happy to report that I found it, starting with many of the recipients of the Phil Kaufman Award. Kaufman, who died in 1992 while on a business trip in Japan, was a creative and innovative force within the areas of hardware, software, semiconductors, EDA and computer architecture. He was CEO of Quickturn Design Systems, now part of Cadence, and accelerated the use of emulation. It’s easy to understand why a prestigious industry award carries his name.
The emulation and verification space is one segment of EDA that creates unlimited opportunities for innovative types. The founders of my company EVE, for example, boldly redesigned the architecture of a hardware emulation platform and, in my humble opinion, transformed a market segment.
Real Intent is another good example. Formal verification is a hard and complicated problem. That didn’t appear to deter Real Intent’s founders who pressed on and devised an innovative approach that makes the lives of many verification engineers much easier.
Entrepreneurial Rajeev Madhavan concluded in the late 1990s that synthesis needed to be linked with physical design. He and his innovative team at Magma introduced the first physical synthesis and rocked the industry. And, with Madhavan still at the helm, Magma is still innovating today. Now, Oasys Design Systems’ team introduced a new synthesis methodology known as Chip Synthesis, enabling designers to synthesize full chips and not just blocks. That technology, too, is rocking the industry.
Over in Alameda, Calif., Verific Design Automation has taken the mundane task of developing hardware description language parsers and elaborators and built it into a successful business. In the meantime, these tools have become the industry’s de facto standard front-end software for just about every imaginable EDA and FPGA company. This is innovative thinking at its greatest.
Of course, anyone who has been in EDA for a while can point to pockets of tremendous optimism and enthusiasm that resonates throughout the industry. Who needs security or a safe place when there was a big adventure with an innovative and entrepreneurial big thinker just waiting for you in the Silicon Valley office complex next door?
We’re heading into DVCon later this month and DAC in June where we will see many more examples of creative thinking, enthusiasm and optimism in EDA. I am looking forward to being wowed.