IP Vendors Join with
Verification Leader to Provide Customers with Objective Proof of Quality
for IP Cores
Los Gatos, Calif. (USA) - March 4,
2002 - TransEDA® PLC, the leader in ready-to-use verification solutions
for electronic systems, announced the launch of the TransEDA IP Quality
Alliance Program, through which silicon IP vendors can provide their customers
with an independent and objective measurement of how well their IP cores
have been verified.
The program offers an online service to
provide IP users with objective and detailed evidence of the quality of
an IP core's verification. In addition, the program provides member companies
with a complimentary copy of TransEDA's VN-Property DX[tm] dynamic property
checker to facilitate development of IP properties to help their customers
speed verification of IP-based designs.
"There has already been a lot of interest
in the TransEDA IP Quality Alliance Program, and we believe it will deliver
competitive advantages to both IP providers and their customers," said
Udo Muerle, vice president of European sales at TransEDA. "Through the
program our IP vendors can differentiate themselves from other IP companies
by offering potential customers an independent assessment of how well their
IP cores have been verified. In addition, prospective IP customers can
more easily justify their investment in IP cores, and purchase with more
confidence than ever before."
Founding Members
Founding members of the TransEDA IP Quality
Alliance Program include Evatronix S.A., Fraunhofer IMS, Memec Inicore
AG (Memec Design Services), Mentor Graphics, sci-worx and Tality.
"Through its contributions to both the
Reuse Methodology Manual and OpenMORE, Mentor Graphics has been instrumental
in defining and using a high-quality verification process for IP cores,"
said Jimmy Awan, director of engineering for the Mentor Graphics Inventra
IP Division. "We have used TransEDA's verification products for many years
to assess and improve our verification process. We welcome the IP Quality
Alliance as a way we can provide evidence of the quality of our cores to
our valued customers."
Peter Neumann, senior engineer for system-on-chip
integration at sci-worx said, "sci-worx is dedicated to providing the highest
quality, best-verified IP. We verify all of our cores to 100% statement,
100% branch and 90% condition coverage and look forward to providing objective
evidence of this to our customers through TransEDA's IP Quality Alliance
program. In addition, we are eager to begin working with TransEDA to provide
property libraries that our customers can use to speed the verification
of systems incorporating our cores."
The Need For Quality Assurance
The use of third-party IP cores alongside
in-house generated blocks to build system-on-chips (SoCs) is commonplace,
but selecting 'off-the-shelf' IP cores can be difficult since quality varies
widely. There is no way to know if a core has been fully verified. With
rising development and production costs, IP consumers need to be confident
they can integrate third-party IP with their design with minimal risk of
delay due to integration or debug issues.
According to Muerle, "TransEDA has identified
a real need of IP users for a method of objectively qualifying silicon
intellectual property. IP providers typically do not supply evidence of
the verification quality of their IP cores, and there is no recognised
criterion for measuring the quality, so consumers are left with a difficult
choice."
How the Program Works
The IP Quality Alliance Program procedure
is easy to use, automated and free of charge for members and their customers.
Program members provide the results files from TransEDA's VN-Cover[tm]
coverage analysis solution and VN-Check[tm] configurable HDL checker to
their prospective customer. After a short registration process on the TransEDA
web site, the prospective customer uploads the results files to the program's
web site at www.transeda.com/ipquality.
The prospective customer can then view
an objective report on the level of coverage achieved by the IP vendor's
verification process and the IP core?s conformance to specific HDL rules.
This independent view of the level of verification quality can be used
as a comparison metric between similar cores from different vendors.
In addition, members can use TransEDA's
VN-Property DX dynamic property checker to better verify their IP and to
develop core-specific properties that can be delivered along with each
IP core. This will enable IP customers using VN-Property DX to measure
how well they have verified the core once it has been integrated in the
system.
Joining the TransEDA IP Quality Alliance
Program
IP vendors who are interested in joining
the TransEDA IP Quality Alliance Program should e-mail
ipquality@transeda.com
for more information.
Qualified IP vendors who join the program
in 2002 will receive a complimentary, one-year subscription license to
TransEDA's VN-Property DX dynamic property checker so they can begin developing
properties specific to their IP cores. These properties can be delivered
to customers along with a core to accelerate verification of the core when
it is integrated into a system. Additional details and requirements for
the program can be obtained at the program?s website at
www.transeda.com/ipquality.
Contacts:
TransEDA - Tom Borgstrom,
(408) 907-2225; tom.borgstrom@transeda.com.
PentaCom - Sharon Graves,
+44 1242 525205, sharon.graves@btinternet.com.
Armstrong Kendall, Inc.
- Jen Bernier, (408) 975-9863, jen@akipr.com.
