Cadence SP&R Solution Used by Geocast Network Systems to Tape-Out Data Decoder; Cadence IC Design Tool Helps Geocast Reach Timing Closure.

Business Editors/High-tech Writers

SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 11, 2000

Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NYSE:CDN), the world's leading supplier of electronic design products and services, today announced the successful design and tape-out of the Geocast Network Systems, Inc. data decoder integrated circuit (IC) using Cadence(R) SP&R (synthesis/place-and-route) solutions. Geocast's Oregon-based hardware development team used the Cadence Envisia(TM) Physically Knowledgeable Synthesis (PKS) physical synthesis and Silicon Ensemble(TM) PKS (SE-PKS) optimization place-and-route tools to quickly reach timing closure on an integrated circuit (IC) design project.

"We chose the Cadence SP&R solution for our data decoder design because it offers an integrated front-to-back IC design flow that provides the speed, quality, control, and ease-of-use that we need," said Jim Jackson, vice president of hardware engineering for Geocast. "PKS helped us achieve our timing goals for this chip. Companies designing digital communication systems require the precise, no-surprises IC implementation that the SP&R solution provides."

Geocast is building a new platform that enables the efficient delivery of personalized broadband services to the PC desktop. At the heart of the Geocast platform is the Geocast personal broadband server which connects directly to a user's PC via a USB or Ethernet port. The personal broadband server requires custom silicon that can receive and process hundreds gigabytes of data per day.

Geocast easily integrated Envisia PKS and SE-PKS into the company's existing flow to tape-out the design in just six weeks and beat its performance goal. Steve Bartling, senior manager of Custom Design Service team for Geocast commented, "This is our first tape-out in 0.18 micron technology. The data decoder is a complex design, containing a digital delay lock loop (DLL) frequency multiplier, and a triple decryption-encryption standard (DES) engine. We inserted six custom RAM blocks into the design and PKS accurately predicted routing. We could not have completed this design in time without PKS providing predictable performance of the design in synthesis, which allows our designers to go forward with confidence that we will have what we need in place and route with SE-PKS. The synthesis tool predicted physically accurate timing within 160 pico-seconds of final performance based on the global route of the design. That's synthesis-predicted to final-routed precision to within 2.6 percent."

"Geocast turned to Cadence because the concurrent optimization capabilities in the SP&R design flow eliminates timing surprises," stated Jeff Roane, vice president of SP&R marketing at Cadence. "Designers at Geocast were able to achieve predicted final timing quickly. Geocast's successful tape-out is another example showing that Cadence has the most complete front-to-back solution for complex IC and system-on-chip designs."

About Cadence SP&R

Cadence SP&R consists of two products, Envisia PKS physical synthesis and Silicon Ensemble PKS optimization place-and-route. This SP&R solution is superior to heterogeneous IC design environments, as it features correlation within 3% through common timing, synthesis, placement, and routing engines used by both logic designers and physical designers.

About Envisia PKS physical synthesis

Envisia PKS is the most complete and tightly integrated physical synthesis solution on the market. It achieves tight correlation with final routed results because its synthesis, timing, placement, and true global routing engines are integrated into the same tool. This integration also provides better quality of results, seen in the frequency and area of the design.

About Silicon Ensemble PKS optimization place-and-route

Silicon Ensemble PKS (SE-PKS) uses Cadence PKS technology to completely restructure gate-level netlists produced by conventional wireload-model-based synthesis. It can also directly read Envisia PKS databases that contain placement and global routing information, making it the only place-and-route tool that can accept forward-annotated global routing. SE-PKS is a comprehensive place-and-route tool that incorporates enhanced industry-standard constraint support, which makes it much easier to move designs from conventional synthesis into place-and-route, and to adopt a timing-driven design flow.

Pricing and Availability

Cadence Envisia PKS physical synthesis and SE-PKS optimization place-and-route are available for UNIX-based workstations from Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems, and for AIX-based workstations from IBM. One-year U.S. list prices start at $100,000 and $400,000, respectively. For information on international pricing, please contact the local Cadence sales office.

About Cadence

Cadence is the largest supplier of electronic design automation products, methodology services, and design services used to accelerate and manage the design of semiconductors, computer systems, networking and telecommunications equipment, consumer electronics, and a variety of other electronics-based products. With approximately 5,100 employees and 1999 annual revenue of $1.1 billion, Cadence has sales offices, design centers, and research facilities around the world. The company is headquartered in San Jose, Calif., and traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol CDN. More information about the company, its products, and its services may be obtained from the World Wide Web at http://www.cadence.com.

Note to Editors: Cadence and the Cadence logo are registered trademarks, and Envisia and Silicon Ensemble are trademarks of Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.