Liga Systems Unveils Breakthrough Hybrid Simulator That Boosts Traditional RTL Simulation by 10 to 100 Times.

SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- Plug-In VLIW Turbocharger Leverages Existing Simulation Infrastructure and Eliminates the Need to Implement Designs in Hardware Accelerators

Liga Systems, Inc., a Silicon Valley-Based EDA company focused on delivering lightning-fast RTL simulation to the desktop, emerged from stealth today to unveil NitroSIM(TM), its breakthrough, patented, drop-in Hybrid Simulator that boosts desktop and compute farm server simulation speed by 10 to 100 times. Hybrid Simulation is a simulation technology harnessing patented software and hardware techniques that enables acceleration of RTL simulation without compromising software simulation features, pricing or capacity. To chip designers, NitroSIM's very long instruction word (VLIW) turbocharger appears to process the simulation exactly like a standard processor, but orders of magnitude faster and with no change to the existing simulation flow. NitroSIM eliminates the computation bottleneck in System-on-Chip (SoC) designs of up to 300 million gates -- a bottleneck that usually persists even with the use of costly simulation server farms or FPGA- and processor-based hardware accelerators. NitroSIM's processing power copes easily with increasing work-load, while its simulator-like behavior makes it ideal for use by RTL design, verification, firmware and IP engineers.

NitroSIM tackles the verification productivity gap caused by the inability of workstation-based software simulation to scale adequately with today's increasing design size, and the fundamental incompatibility of FPGA- and processor-based hardware accelerators with software simulators. NitroSIM's VLIW processor deploys massive parallel processing capability and simultaneously eliminates the cache memory miss problem -- a failure to access instructions and data in cache memory -- which becomes the dominant factor in overall simulation performance as design size grows. The resultant simulation performance boost enables the deployment of fewer compute farm resources, reducing hardware costs. NitroSIM supports commonly used software simulation features, most notably testbenches, 4-state handling, behavioral checks and assertions, which are not supported by hardware accelerators. Moreover, when using testbenches, NitroSIM can deliver greater performance gains than hardware accelerators and does so at a greatly reduced cost.

"In simple terms, NitroSIM is a desktop software simulator with a hardware turbo-charger, available at software prices," said Henry Verheyen, president and CEO of Liga Systems. "NitroSIM is a drop-in solution. It uses the same testbenches and simulation scripts as your standard software simulator, leverages existing compute hardware and software infrastructures, with the critical difference being that it runs 10x to 100x faster than software simulation. We have seen great success with our early customers, and are now seeking to expand our efforts with a larger group of customers through a special Beta Program before making our product available to the broader marketplace."

Unlike hardware accelerators, NitroSIM requires no FPGAs or processors to map the design functionality, as the design is, in its entirety, compiled into memory instructions for execution by the VLIW processor. With its small form factor, NitroSIM fits inside a desktop or server PC as a plug-in upgrade, requiring no additional space. NitroSIM's compile and set-up time is on the order of hours and can be applied to all phases of RTL design: from small blocks, to big blocks, to the entire chip, to multi-chip. This breakthrough solution provides users the ability to simulate and verify entire systems at high simulation speeds at an affordable cost.

Liga Systems will have a NitroSIM system on display in exhibition booth #4351, and will also provide in-depth private product demonstrations within its demo suites at the Design Automation Conference (DAC) from July 24-27, 2006, at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, California. To learn more and schedule a suite presentation at DAC, please call 408-745-6100 x225 or email [e-mail].

Pricing and Availability

NitroSIM is available now in a beta version to select customers, and can be ordered this quarter. Priced at $50,000 (US list) for a complete unit with a maximum capacity of 300 million gates.

About Liga Systems

Liga Systems, Inc. is a privately-held EDA company focused on delivering lightning-fast RTL simulation to the desktop. The company serves test, verification and IP markets with breakthrough hybrid simulation technology that turbocharges performance at a dramatically reduced cost. Liga's plug-in VLIW turbocharger leverages existing simulation infrastructure, tackles SoC designs of up to 300 million gates, and eliminates the need to implement designs in FPGAs or processors. Founded in 2003, Liga Systems is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. For details on how to boost the speed of software-based simulation, increase capacity, scale with growing design sizes, reduce overall functional verification costs and benefit from this breakthrough simulation solution, please visit: http://www.ligasystems.com.

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