Magma and ARM announce comprehensive, low-power implementation solution for low-power SoC designs

Fully automated implementation solution supports designs with multiple supply voltages and leakage management, including MTCMOS power gating, using Magma's Blast Power

SANTA CLARA, California and CAMBRIDGE, England, April 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Magma(r) Design Automation Inc. (Nasdaq: LAVA), a provider of chip design solutions, and ARM ((LSE:ARM); (Nasdaq:ARMHY)), today announced the availability of a complete RTL-to-GDSII, low-power implementation solution for system-on-chip (SoC) designs. The solution uses Magma's Blast Power(tm) product to enable designers to create a single integrated implementation that provides significant power reduction when the SoC is in asynchronous mode, while maintaining optimal performance when operating synchronously.

This low-power extension to the existing ARM-Magma reference methodology utilizes Magma's Blast Power to implement a number of power reduction techniques. These include support for designs with multiple supply voltage domains, concurrent multi-VT optimization, power gating with MTCMOS, clock gating and multi-mode analysis and optimization. In addition, Blast Rail(tm) has been incorporated to provide static, dynamic and transient power and voltage drop analysis. The presence of multiple voltage islands in the design is handled automatically with physically aware level shifter and isolation cell insertion coupled with automatic power grid synthesis and voltage domain-based optimization.

This solution has been enabled with an ARM(r) Metro(tm) standard cell library and provides customers with the ability to rapidly implement low-power designs with minimal manual intervention, thereby significantly reducing time-to-market for power sensitive SoC designs.

"A complete, low- power implementation solution is critical to our customer's success," said Neal Carney, vice president of marketing, ARM Physical IP. "By enabling Magma to develop a comprehensive low-power solution with our IP products, we are together ensuring the success of our mutual customers by enabling the rapid implementation and deployment of advanced, energy efficient IP."
"Magma has been working with key customers for several years to develop a comprehensive low-power solution," said Premal Buch, general manager Magma's Design Implementation Business Unit. "Magma's integrated flow lends itself well to enabling the power versus timing versus area tradeoffs throughout the RTL-to-GDSII flow. We are seeing a clear momentum from our customers toward adopting this solution to help meet the needs of their low-power designs, especially at 90 nanometers and even more advanced processes."

"Magma is pro-active in developing a total solution ahead of designers' needs," said Michael Ma, vice president, Foundry and IP Relationships at Magma. "This implementation flow with the ARM Metro low-power library continues our drive to enable designers to tackle 90-nanometer and newer design challenges."

Availability
Blast Power, Blast Rail and the low-power design methodology are available from Magma.

About ARM
ARM designs the technology that lies at the heart of advanced digital products, from wireless, networking and consumer entertainment solutions to imaging, automotive, security and storage devices. ARM's comprehensive product offering includes 16/32-bit RISC microprocessors, data engines, 3D processors, digital libraries, embedded memories, peripherals, software and development tools, as well as analog functions and high-speed connectivity products. Combined with the company's broad Partner community, they provide a total system solution that offers a fast, reliable path to market for leading electronics companies. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com/.

About Magma Design Automation
Magma provides leading software for designing highly complex integrated circuits while maximizing Quality of Results with respect to area, timing and power, and at the same time reducing overall design cycles and costs. Magma provides a complete RTL-to-GDSII design flow that includes design planning, prototyping, synthesis, place & route, and signal and power integrity chip design capabilities in a single executable, offering "The Fastest Path from RTL to Silicon"(tm). Magma's software also includes products for advanced physical synthesis and architecture development tools for programmable logic devices (PLDs); capacitance extraction; and characterization and modeling. The company's stock trades on Nasdaq under the ticker symbol LAVA. Visit Magma Design Automation on the Web at www.magma-da.com.

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS:
Except for the historical information contained herein, the matters set forth in this press release, including statements about the features and benefits of Magma's system and ARM's low power processor solutions, are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the "safe harbor" provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially including, but not limited to, Magma's and ARM's decision to continue working together, abilities to keep pace with rapidly changing technology and each company's products abilities to produce desired results. Further discussion of these and other potential risk factors may be found in Magma's latest filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission on form 10-K, and any subsequent updates thereto on form10-Q. These forward-looking statements speak only as of the date hereof. Magma disclaims any obligation to update these forward-looking statements.

ARM is a registered trademark of ARM Limited. Metro is a trademark of ARM Limited. Artisan is a trademark of ARM Physical IP, Inc. All other brands or product names are the property of their respective holders. "ARM" is used to represent ARM Holdings plc; its operating company ARM Limited; and the regional subsidiaries ARM INC.; ARM KK; ARM Korea Ltd.; ARM Taiwan; ARM France SAS; ARM Consulting (Shanghai) Co. Ltd.; ARM Belgium N.V.; AXYS Design Automation Inc.; AXYS GmbH; ARM Embedded Solutions Pvt. Ltd.; and ARM Physical IP, Inc.

Magma is a registered trademark, and Blast Power, Blast Rail and "The Fastest Path from RTL to Silicon," are trademarks of Magma Design Automation. Other products and trademarks are owned by their respective companies.