eASIC rolls 90-nm structured ASIC line

Mark LaPedus, EE Times
(11/08/2006 9:54 PM EST)

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — FPGA vendors claim that they have conquered the ASIC for high-end designs. Some, however, believe that the battle is far from over. Seeking to displace FPGAs and other chip technologies in the marketplace, eASIC Corp. on Wednesday (Nov. 8) came out of its shell with a bang by unveiling a new 90-nm structured ASIC line. The company also disclosed a new foundry partnership with Fujitsu Ltd. and an EDA arrangement with Magma Design Automation Inc.

eASIC's 90-nm offering, dubbed Nextreme, is a family of six programmable structured ASICs, ranging in densities from 350,000 to 5 million gates — at performance levels up to 350-MHz. The Nextreme parts are quick turnaround devices that provide higher speeds but lower power levels than competitive FPGAs and ASICs, according to Ronnie Vasishta, chief executive for eASIC (Santa Clara, Calif.).

The fabless ASIC house also disclosed that it will no longer use STMicroelectronics Inc. (Geneva) as its main foundry. With its older-generation, 130-nm structured ASIC lines, eASIC had its parts built by STMicroelectronics on a foundry basis using a direct-write electron-beam manufacturing process.

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