( ESNUG 524 Item 1 ) -------------------------------------------- [05/16/13]
Subject: Leak says Cadence taking on Synopsys PrimeTime monopoly at DAC
Editor's Note: 05/20 - broke Tempus story 76 hours ago. 3 hours ago
Cadence does press release confirming all of this! Yea! - John
SINGLE SOURCE: I want to go on record that this tip came from a person whom
I've known 10+ years. Either this rumor is right -- and I got a scoop. :)
Or it's wrong -- and I'll have to publicly apologize. :(
So either Cadence will be showing a new STA tool called "Tempus" at the
Austin DAC that will go against PrimeTime. Or they won't. It'll work by
doing path-based analysis -- not graph-based analysis -- distributed over
multiple CPUs on multiple machines. Or it won't. Some Magma SPICE guys
will be involved. Or they won't. (Two weeks will tell.)
My problem is that this rumor was simply too juicy to not publish.
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From: [ Deep Throat ]
Hi John,
I know how you like to get tips.
Cadence is going to take a serious run at the Synopsys PrimeTime
monopoly in this DAC. They will announce a new static timing
tool called "Tempus". Cadence will claim it is at least 10X
faster than PT, with unlimited capacity, and better accuracy.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
WTF? How do you know this? Rumor or fact?
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
Fact. Got it from XXXX XXXX.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
I dunno. Sounds fishy. Is this a CDNS mktg retread of ETS?
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
I don't think so. There's no freaking way that ETS could ever
be improved. The code is pretty old and dog slow. It uses an
old delay calc engine, too. It's as old as dirt.
I heard that Chi Ping ordered Tempus to be a complete re-write of
the base timer algorithms from the ground up. Supposedly they
developed a new massively parallel timing architecture that can
be distributed over multiple CPUs on multiple machines.
Normally I would have laughed at the thought of anything new
coming from Cadence but I know that this is being driven by some
ex-Magma guys who worked on FineSim and SiliconSmart. So I guess
it's possible this time. They've been working on this since after
Aart bought LAVA. From what I hear these guys are planning to
take SNPS head on. Hope they're wearing helmets.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
Yeah, yeah, yeah - 10X is such a BS marketing number! What
isn't 10X faster these days??? Do you have any real proof?
Real data? And "unlimited capacity", ... yea, ... right.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
They ran a 50 M instance design at XXXXX in 3 hrs on 8 CPUs.
PT took 8.5 hrs also on 8 CPUs. But because this new timer in
Tempus is massively parallel, it can run 50 M instances on
32 CPUS in less than 1 hr -- 9X speed up over PT. BTW PT is not
able to run on multiple machines. Not quite 10X - but close.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
I don't see how CDNS has the juice to take on the PT monopoly.
Temporary high performance alone is not a winning strategy.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
Totally agree. I'm not convinced either that CDNS can get market
share from Anton. Every time PT was threatened, Synopsys did
everything they could to protect their baby. Extreme and Magma
got close, SNPS took them out with lawyers and money.
To date no one has successfully challenged PT.
Their supposedly massively parallel architecture may be enough to
generate some interest; maybe get them in the door, but Lip-bu will
need to do more. One way CDNS will try to differentiate is with a
new path based analysis (PBA) engine. It's a more accurate way to
do STA vs. a more traditional graph based analysis method. CDNS
will also claim at least 10X performance over PT with PBA, too.
If this is true and it actually works, it'll be big for companies
like QCOM, BRCM, and AMD. Being able to analyze more nets in PBA
significantly cuts pessimism. Big selling point.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
What about SSTA? Has TSMC certified Tempus for sign-off? What
about SI/crosstalk issues? What libs does it use (CDNS CPF only?)
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
Don't know.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
Any user companies looking at it? Name names.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ Deep Throat ]
Don't know. Most likely CDNS friendlies like Freescale, TI, and
NXP. But I imagine Cadence will go after customers like QCOM,
BRCM, Intel, and Apple to steal accounts from SNPS. But I think
it will be really hard to break into those accounts because of
their deep reliance on SNPS tools and IP.
Hope you like the tip - you owe me big time.
---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
From: [ John Cooley ]
We'll see. :)
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Editor's Note: 05/20 - broke Tempus story 76 hours ago. 3 hours ago
Cadence does press release confirming all of this! Yea! - John
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