( ESNUG 566 Item 1 ) -------------------------------------------- [02/02/17]
Subject: 92% of EDA users say Justice was NOT served in SNPS-Atoptech case
IT'S NOT ABOUT PnR TOOLS: Beyond the expected user concerns about reduced
competition (41%), kills EDA innovation (32%), and hurts EDA interop (28%)
plus the cynical "SNPS lawyer games" (29%), "this is Aart bullying" (12%),
and "this is ridiculous" (11%),
the majority of users had more practical concerns about Aart now winning the
legal right to sue rivals over his SW file formats (61%), SW commands (52%),
and SW APIs (18%) -- plus they were also furious Atoptech was pushed into
bankruptcy even though Atoptech didn't steal any Synopsys source code (14%).
SURVEY QUESTION:
"A month after Synopsys won a permanent injunction prohibiting AtopTech
from selling any EDA product "containing PrimeTime report formats or
certain PrimeTime non-SDC commands, variables or attributes" on 12/21/16,
on Friday, AtopTech filed for voluntary Chapter 11 bankruptcy in U.S.
Bankruptcy Court in Delaware. "... and has selected a stalking horse
bidder. The company expects that a bankruptcy auction will take place
in mid-March 2017 and the sale will be completed by March 31, 2017."
WSJ reports AtopTech "has $8 million takeover bid from Draper Athena"."
Q1: In your *anonymous* opinion, was JUSTICE served in this lawsuit?
(Choose YES or NO) Please explain why.
NO: ############################################## 92%
EDA file formats aren't IP: ############################## 61%
EDA command names aren't IP: ########################## 52%
EDA tool APIs aren't IP: ######### 18%
Atop didn't steal source code: ####### 14%
this is Aart bullying: ###### 12%
this was SNPS lawyer games: ############### 29%
"this is ridiculous": ##### 11%
shows Synopsys is hurting: #### 8%
the judge not tech savvy: ### 6%
YES: #### 8%
Atop copied PT formats: #### 8%
IP protection is good for all: # 1%
Q2: In your *anonymous* opinion is this (Choose one) GOOD, BAD, or
NEUTRAL news for the EDA industry? Again, please explain why.
BAD: ################################################ 96%
reduces EDA competition: #################### 41%
kills EDA innovation: ################ 32%
hurts EDA tool interoperability: ############## 28%
raises EDA SW prices: ##### 11%
creates SNPS monopoly: ############### 31%
creates SNPS/CDNS duopoly: 1%
creates single-vendor lock-in: ####### 15%
"Innovate, not litigate!": ######### 17%
opens EDA to endless lawsuits: ##### 11%
hurts EDA start-ups: ########### 23%
stifles EDA VC funding: ## 4%
shows EDA is dying: #### 8%
stagnates EDA: ####### 14%
GOOD: # 1%
means new PnR start-ups coming: # 1%
NEUTRAL: ## 3%
Atoptech was dying anyway: ## 3%
The other dark side users voiced concerns on were "raises EDA prices" (11%),
"hurts EDA start-ups" (23%), and shows EDA is dying/stagnating (20%).
Plus users feared "creates SNPS monopoly" (31%), and "creates single-vendor
lock-in" (15%).
AND FOR THE REST OF THE STORY: This was an emotional topic for many. I
received a grand total of 384 emails, texts, and phone calls in this survey.
Users comprised 271 of the responses -- their stats and comments are above.
I'll have the 113 EDA vendor's reactions to the SNPS-ATOP case on Monday.
- John Cooley
DeepChip.com Holliston, MA
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"WTF?!! SOFTWARE FILE FORMATS, COMMANDS, AND APIs ARE NOT IP!"
NO. Synopsys didn't compete fairly. Ultimately a format is just a
format, it contains no algorithmic secret sauce that Synopsys can
claim ownership of. Getting an injunction against Atoptech for
something as trivial as a command set and forcing them to seek
bankruptcy protection is infuriating.
This is BAD news. It shows that Synopsys has stopped innovating and
is shamefully using its monopoly to prevent others from competing.
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I was very saddened to hear of the Atop decision.
Q1. No - Justice was not served. In my view, parsing reading and
writing of textual files for whatever the purpose is a valid.
It is also primary principle since the birth of Unix and early
days of EDA with the engineering benefit of piping output and
input to produce results.
Q2. Bad - Removes competition and hurts technology breakthroughs.
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NO. Patents or copyrights on report formats restricts competition.
BAD. Beat your competitors with better products, not by courts.
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NO. Formats, commands, variables, and attributes are not the
essential parts of technology. Proprietizing them hinders open
collaboration and fair competition in chip design.
BAD. Because of the same reason above. It also strengthens the
monopoly of Synopsys in the field.
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Usually I don't participate in your surveys, John. But I am
compelled to do so this time.
NO. This is really bad for EDA innovations, on simple data
format stuff.
BAD! Not good for encouraging innovations. We have already
seen very few new EDA startups.
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Q1: NO -- Primetime reporting formats are not what people pay Synopsys
licenses for. Customers pay for the algorithms and circuit analysis
that Primetime delivers. AtopTech used the same reporting format in
order to make a simple transition to their PnR tool. Has Atop used
their own format, then customers would merely have to write a script
to transform formats. This would probably take a couple hours' time
for an individual, but is not intellectual property.
Protecting the Primetime format is like saying the value of a house is
the paint on the outside, and allows Synopsys to protect its market
share on grounds such as this is an attack on free markets.
Q2: BAD news for the EDA industry. Everyone who owned a phone in the
1990s also had distain for the fact that every phone had a different
charging plug. Like-wise having multiple EDA tool reporting formats
is a waste of time.
Also, this Synopsys/Atoptech court case only discourages new and
inventive companies from entering the market -- because these start-ups
may be dismantled on equally baseless grounds by the Big 3 companies
with the deepest pockets.
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NO, there was no theft. It was just use of a file format.
BAD, further barriers for innovation when EDA point tools can't fit
into 3rd party flows.
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NO & BAD
Why it is wrong to use PrimeTime formats, as long as the algorithms
behind the tool is unique? Aside to that, (Cadence) Ambit used
report_timing like commands and the court has given OK on this.
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NO & BAD
If SNPS needs to defend a tool by look-and-feel then it must not be
differentiated in any other manner. So they are eliminating
competition not by outperforming them, but simply by using a "we got
there first" file format claim. That is not making their tool set
any better.
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JUSTICE was not served.
This is BAD for the industry.
If a company can get an injunction against another company for simply
copying a file format or imitating the commands, that opens the door
for all sorts of non-software freedom. It also stifles competition
amongst vendors nor does it promote the kind of interoperability that
OpenAccess member companies claim to be seeking (even though this is
not part of an OpenAccess spec).
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In my *anonymous* opinion, NO and BAD, BAD, BAD, BAD!!!!
PrimeTime report formats and commands constitute a de-facto standard
and should be treated as such. If standards, official and de-facto,
can be monopolized with court backing, EDA industry will stagnate
even more than it has over past 20+ years.
And, yes, it is a stagnating industry.
The fact that the US government pays no attention to such blatantly
monopolistic behavior -- and the fact that the courts support such
blatantly monopolistic behavior -- merely demonstrates how unimportant
the entire EDA industry is deemed to be.
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NO and BAD. Here's why:
I'm torn, but I'm going to come down on the side that justice was *not*
served in that the Primetime report format and commands are not really
anything innovative. They are just a somewhat arbitrary format and
language Synopsys is using to protect marketshare, monopolistically.
If another company can innovate in algorithms (quality of results,
turnaround-time, etc.) but has a high barrier to entry because of the
lawyer cost of adoption, that's BAD for the industry. It will stifle
investment (as if investors aren't already avoiding EDA).
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NO. Those formats claimed in the lawsuit do not seem to be reasonable
objects to protect.
BAD and GOOD. It is bad to EDA users because it makes the PnR market
less competitive which usually means slower innovation, lower quality
of service and higher price.
It is GOOD to potentially incubate a new vendor with a better
management team who is going to acquire the technology to provide
a better PnR solution for the EDA industry.
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NO. A report format doesn't have much propriety info to it. Going
to get us to less competition in future.
BAD. Going to limit the ability of tool compatibility if tools can
not use competitors formats to work with.
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Q1: NO, the injunction is about the interface of PrimeTime. It does not
relates to the core technology of PrimeTime. What's the point of
this judgment? Like ISA of processors? They are totally different.
Q2: BAD, it restricts design flow automation/interaction between tools.
Having a design flow *between* tools is essential for this industry.
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NO. Absolutely not. It is a format for a data structure and commands.
Imagine I disallow you to say "Good morning" in the morning, "Good day"
during the day, and "Good evening" in the evening. That is a data
structure with commands embedded: Parse time, then react accordingly
with the proper data in the data structure.
This court decision is absolutely ridiculous.
BAD. Actually, terrible. If I develop a tool, and it uses mySQL or
Cassandra to keep the data (which would be an appropriate choice), and
I define a logical data structure for my design data, then it is highly
likely that this data structure generically reflects my design.
If someone tries to patent this approach it should be rejected by the
USPTO as this reflects the state of the art.
Circumventing the state of the art provision in the patent system by
using a court with a clearly uneducated judge is not the way to advance
science. Again, if I develop a tool and someone else uses the same
data structures and the same commands then that's the state of the art
to describe a chip. Using the same data structures and commands is
what makes up the state of the art.
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NO. Justice NOT served. APIs cannot & should not be patented. Nor
should reporting formats. Nothing wrong in writing a wrapper script
that makes it easier for users of one EDA tool to switch to another.
This is BAD for an already shrinking/consolidating EDA industry.
Less competition means, less innovation, higher prices which will
contribute to fewer silicon start ups.
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JUSTICE was NOT served in this lawsuit.
The courts have denied copyright protection to phone books because
there is not much intellectual addition to putting names in an
ordered list.
By the same token, if you want to report the timing, there is not
much intellectual addition to creating a command report_timing
This is BAD for the EDA industry.
This makes it harder to provide an alternative to the dominant EDA
tools because designer need to learn two (or more) sets of arbitrary
command names.
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NO.
I do not believe there is a clear societal case for copyrighting APIs.
It started with "APIs are copyrightable" case between Oracle and Google.
Government intervention is needed to remove APIs and commands from
copyright and patents.
BAD:
This ruling, even if legally correct, will have a chilling effect on
an already small EDA market by damaging interoperability. It opens
the door to litigation over any products that share a command set.
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NO. Formatting of outputs, naming of variables/attributes should not
be protected as IP. If there is something non-intuitive/innovative
about a unique report or variable/attribute in their tool, they should
file a patent of that specific report/variable/attribute from
competitors copying it.
BAD. This makes competition among EDA tools much more difficult, as
the bar for customers to switch between tools artificially includes
the cost of retraining, rather than just being based on comparison of
the features/capabilities of each of the tools.
It adds costs for translation layers for customers who want to use
competing EDA tools for various parts of design or verification flows.
I think the industry (customer) response to this ought to be to push
for further standardization/extension of SDC, such that it includes
commands/variables/attributes which duplicate the functionality of all
those non-SDC equivalents which were covered by the Atoptech lawsuit,
and a new standard may be needed for the reporting/output side, such
that customers going forward can insist Synopsys (and others) conform
to these standards, to allow open interoperability between tools.
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AART BULLYING, SNPS LAWYER GAMES, and "THIS IS RIDICULOUS!"
NO. This is Aart bullying the weak.
BAD. Now less competition in P&R world. Now if CDNS or SNPS
hires AtopTech engineers, then their tools may be faster.
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NO. This bullying against AtopTech is not justified. The same lawsuit
could be filed against a number of other small EDA vendors using SDC
information. It's not the first time Synopsys bankrupt other companies.
I suspect there will be more to come.
This is BAD news. Fewer competitors means higher prices for electronic
design companies. Assume the same restrictions applies to other small
EDA vendors, this limitation stifles innovation.
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Q1: NO. Justice is subjective. Might is right. Synopsys used
its might to bully a smaller company. They used the justice
system for this but that does not mean that justice was served.
Q2: BAD. This is not good for the EDA industry. Another start-up
is now gone. The PnR users will be beholden to the pace of
innovation at the Big 3 EDA companies which will further slow down
because of reduced competition. Semiconductor companies have to
think about how much they should nurture the EDA eco-system.
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NO; Aart won by trying to get Atoptech's original legal team dismissed
from the case (successfully). So TRUE JUSTICE was not served.
BAD; it reinforces the increasingly sad truth that EDA startups will be
killed by the monopolists/oligopolists in EDA. Just look at the
landscape in the last few years: Extreme DA, Berkeley DA, Atoptech.
The ones with the best technology that got serious market momentum and
revenue got sued by the monopolist in that segment of EDA because that
was the only way to slow down the startups.
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Q1: NO! The whole concept of Primetime command names or assembly OP
codes being copyrighted is ludicrous. If Intel copyrights "BR" for
the Branch OP code, and some other company uses "BR", does that really
have an effect on competition? Only in the minutest of terms.
And now, a competitor to SNPS goes out of business, because of command
name similarities.
This is ridiculous.
Q2: BAD - Any decision like this (barring outright theft or copying)
that causes a company to go bankrupt reduces competition and diminishes
the selection of EDA tools available to increase our (i.e. engineers)
ability to produce ASICs cheaper, faster, sooner.
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Q1: NO. There are too many bogus patents leading to stupid
rulings and ridiculous legal costs. What is SNPS achieving
here? Does this mean EDA start-ups cannot report timing in
a de facto Primetime file format to help users?
Q2: BAD. It promotes silly patents and kills innovation.
Atoptech should move to another country and persevere.
At the rate consolidation is happening, we will be back to the
EDA of the 1980's in no time...
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NO. The ruling seems too harsh. A corp can have patent/copyright/TM
on their source code; but having such privileges over the commands,
variables, and attributes is just ridiculous!!
BAD. The EDA industry is very small & getting smaller every year.
If such tantrums are allowed then we are discouraging any new
start-ups to come around.
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NO
BAD news for EDA and users. Synopsys is resorting to lawsuits to
compete, rather than R&D and innovation.
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NO. Attributes I put in my design are now effectively SNPS property?!
BAD, unless your name is Aart or your job title is "counsel."
This is anti-competitive.
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NO. Synopsys abuses their position on the market. They try to
eliminate competition in an unfair way.
BAD. Synopsys continues their policy to isolate their tools and
customers from competition. Tool isolation is an enemy of tool
innovation.
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Q1: NO. Once again, SNPS sues the innovators instead of innovating.
Q2: BAD. $$$ is being spent on lawyers instead of R&D. Lawyers don't
help engineers get their chips done better/faster, R&D does. Here's
hoping SNPS accidentally sues themselves.
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NO, justice was not served. It helped SNPS enforce their attempt
to create a monopoly or hegemony with their precious PrimeTime,
since everything else for them is pointing south.
BAD, the EDA market is already with pretty much NO competition at
all, no innovation, no new tools, nothing, just choose which one
will better manage all the trouble they will provide you for
six-figures.
If they keep in this path, the next main EDA supplier will be Google.
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Q1: NO, building a drop-in replacement should not be illegal.
Q2: BAD, it seems another victory for stagnation. If EDA can't
learn from each other and be compatible, you can't support
on the previous generation of innovation.
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NO. It is unfortunate that the SDC has not been expanded to support
multi-vendor tool interoperability. No EDA vendor should have control
over file formats or command scripts used to drive tools. There should
be industry standards supported by the tool users to prevent legal
bullying by any one vendor over customer market freedom.
BAD. It removes a strong PnR tool from the marketplace through legal
maneuvering instead of technical superiority. Sad!
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"THE JUDGE & JURY WEREN'T TECH SAVVY ENOUGH TO GIVE A FAIR VERDICT"
NO. This verdict is the outcome of lawyers and by no means of justice.
Even non-technical college graduates find it very hard to understand
a physical chip design flow and the concept of SDC. Asking 12 jurors,
most of whom did not even have college degrees, to decide if the use
of an extension from SDC command option names in the tools constitute
a major infringement of intellectual property is simply ridiculous.
BAD. Absolutely bad.
The talent depletion in Synopsys and even the entire EDA industry has
already given an answer. Without dynamics of startups and competition,
the EDA R&D talent pool is draining out. The smart people going to
Google/Facebook/other internet companies not only because the salary
difference but mostly due to no fun in this area anymore.
In short, the Big 3 EDA companies smothered innovation and start-ups,
which in turn it killed themselves as well. (In this sense, JUSTICE
indeed is served.)
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NO and BAD
Our courts don't have the techinal expertise to accurately judge
high tech lawsuits like this.
Our technically inept legal system is one of the reasons why the U.S.
is failing behind. In China, they don't bother with feeble courts.
Instead internal Chinese technocrats decide these issues in the best
interests of business in China.
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NO, this is a classic 800 pound gorilla pounding on a relatively much
smaller competitor where the gorilla established a defacto industry
standard and then killed the small company for using it. Does not seem
fair if you agree that the PrimteTime report has become an industry
standard format. Once a product owns such a dominant market share, it
should be deemed an "industry standard" and should thereby permit
certain access to traits of that product for integration purposes.
BAD. This clearly stifles innovation and helps to only further the
monopolies of the Big 3 EDA vendors. Small companies need to be able
to insert themselves into the existing eco-systems with their point
solutions or else they could never get off the ground. It is nearly
impossible to enter a mature market without being able to fit in.
Particularly disappointing is that the judge handling this matter
rendered such crippling fines as to kill off AtopTech. It seems to
me that there should have been more reasonable penalty and terms
as well as a strong push to settle the case.
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"WHY YES!, JUSTICE WAS SERVED IN THE SNPS-ATOP CASE!"
YES. IP protection is for both the little guy and the 800 lb gorilla.
NEUTRAL. Knowing there are material consequences for not playing by
the rules creates a more level playing field for innovation. True
innovator value should be in the context of a common set of
playground rules. Change the rules before cheating at the game.
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YES, SNPS has designers hooked on their Primetime syntax and format.
The new players should be innovative else the big-fish always will
find some way of swallowing the small tasty fish!
BAD, few players with tall barrier to enter. File formats and command
names should be moved to generic domain (like an open source) for more
players to enter into the EDA scene.
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Q1: (YES) I just read the court order of Oct 24, 2016 to get an idea of
the case in more detail. Taking only into account what I read in
the court order and according to cases referenced by both plaintiffs
and defendants, it looks like justice was served.
I believe that the Atoptech executives somehow strongly indicated to
Synopsys that they were using the allegedly copyrighted material for
a good cause and even further, and Atop was encouraged by Synopsys to
do so in an effort to promote interoperability. Having said that,
the devil is always in the details and according to the court order,
Atoptech had really hard time to defend that position in court.
Q2: (BAD). I'm always for settlements that make commercial sense when
both parties somehow win something. For the industry it can only be
negative to have Synopsys once again killing a company on the premise
of copyright infringement. EDA users will lose, Synopsys looks very
bad again, EDA engineers will lose their jobs, and no one wins.
My 2 cents.
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Q1: YES, justice was served. Assuming that EDA command sets can be
patented (or copyrighted), hereto and if Atoptech copied said heretofore
commands that have been patented (or copyrighted) by Synopsys, then
Atoptech most probably committed one or multiple copyright infractions
thereof, and thusly JUSTICE has been served. Whether rightfully or not.
Q2: BAD. VERY BAD. Companies, and people, copy one another. Imitation
is the sincerest form of flattery. Losing a company and/or product
means less competition, which translates to higher prices and bad deals
for customers. They should mediate, and cross-license. Now it will
cost more to close timing.
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YES? It's hard for me to say. If Primetime syntax is copyrighted
or otherwise protected, then their use without permission is against
the law. If this was really just about Primetime syntax, then
Atoptech could have found another way around the infringement.
BAD. I think a large company picking on a small one is not good for
the EDA industry, which tends to need start-ups drive innovation to a
greater degree than a general tech industry.
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In this lawsuit, YES. Atoptech should not have copied copyrighted
material from another competitor.
BAD. This just another reason why there should be more oversight
on Cadence and Synopsys as they are preventing competition in the
EDA space.
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By legal term, we should say "YES". However, I think the legal system
is not perfect nor able to cover the EDA industry. Should PrimeTime be
legally protected line by line?
It's BAD news for the EDA industry. It scared away any EDA innovation.
An EDA startup needs to invest too much to get clear of whether it
violates legal rules by big players. The overhead is too much for them.
Big guys should focus more on how to innovate their technology rather
spend big effort stop smaller players passing them.
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"WELL... ATOPTECH WAS DYING ANYWAY..."
NO. It doesn't serve Justice. AtopTech didn't steal source code like
Avanti did, they just "borrowed" the command names and formats, no big
deal.
NEUTRAL. AtopTech was dying on the vine anyway and about to go under
with such a limited customer base.
But really, who cares if the command formats are the same? It is just
Synopsys throwing their weight around again.
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NO. Items in question to me seem part of a de-facto standard. I
am not 100% clear on what was considered a clear violation.
BAD. A duopoly in PnR is strictly worse than a market with a
healthy third player. Additionally, this judgment will make it
even harder to break into EDA markets where established players
with their armies of lawyers can keep you out.
Note: I think Atoptech was in trouble independent of this judgment,
with their largest customer transitioning away after Avago bought
Broadcom. The writing was already on the wall, this just hastened
their end.
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NO, this is a bitter lawsuit since AtopTech was gaining ground in the
router market.
Pretty BAD for the EDA industry. It is harder for the small guys to
survive this days. AtopTech may end up going to Cadence, who needs
it badly.
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"THIS IS HOW AART ACQUIRED MAGMA, EVE, MOSYS, EXTREME-DA..."
NO and BAD -
EDA has a history of stifled innovation based on lawsuits that end in
the small company going bankrupt or being acquired for next to nothing.
This is how Aart picked up EVE Zebu with pocket money.
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NO & BAD.
Dangerous outcomes:
1) Small EDA companies are effectively shut out of the market
to supply niche parts of a flow without a costly or dangerous
license. For example see people developing apps for Apple;
if Apple doesn't like your app there is no appeal.
2) Large EDA companies like SNPS/CDNS/MENT will strip out
compatibility -- leading to single vendor lock-in for flows
or much higher costs to develop mixed flows due to having
to build and maintain translation scripts.
3) Self harm to the product publisher - if APIs become very
application specific their use will decline due to less
individuals being familiar with them or their capabilities.
4) Chilling effect on open source or University projects that
publish any sort of helpful manual or scripting system.
I think someone should create the trophy wall for Aart's office
full of companies that he has shot, eaten and stuffed:
Magma, EVE, Atoptech, MoSys, Nassda, Extreme-DA ...
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"AND WHY ISN'T TSSI SUING EVERYONE OVER WGL FORMAT FILES THEN?"
NO. For example, most EDA tools generate waveforms im WGL format
files that belongs to TSSI. TSSI isn't running around suing them.
BAD. It will open the flood gates for malicious lawsuits that will
ravage the EDA industry.
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"OH, COME ON! EVERY ENGINEER KNOWS ABOUT COPYRIGHT/PATENT GAMES!"
Q1: NO
Q2: NEUTRAL
Come on. These questions are childish. This is the name-of-the-game
in corporate America. Every engineer knows stories about stupid patents
being used to harm other companies, and every company expects to fight
these.
More interested in knowing why AtopTech went bankrupt. Your question
implies it is related to the patent issue. Could you substantiate that?
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