Faraday's Configurable Array Brings Flexibility and Accelerated Time-to-Market for ASIC

HSINCHU, TAIWAN – June 2, 2003- Faraday Technology Corporation, a leading IP and ASIC design service company, today introduced its Three-Mask Programmable Cell Array (3MPCA) family, a high-performance, high-density and easy-to-use re-configurable cell array for UMC 0.35 ìm, 0.25 ìm, 0.18 ìm, 0.15 ìm and 0.13 ìm CMOS processes.

As semiconductor processing migrates to deep sub-micron, the corresponding tooling costs and mask charges also increase significantly. The time to market pressure, frequent feature changes and product derivatives only exacerbate the cost issues further. With its standard cell compatible performance, power efficiency and industry-leading array density, Faraday's 3MPCA helps users drastically reduce mask NRE (Non-Recurring Engineering), and re-spin costs and accelerate time-to-market.

Unlike other one-mask programmable cell arrays which have all their metal layers predefined, Faraday's 3MPCA adopts two top metal layers and one top via mask to do the function programming and interconnects. Customers may create a chip level platform for specific application by adding 3MPCA, originally verified circuit, and selected silicon IP in a chip design. This approach creates a "just-fit" routing plate and array structure hence achieving much higher array density and faster speed than those of one-mask programmable arrays. Compared with FPGA that uses SRAM cells to program the entire array, the 3MPCA boasts standard-cell-like performance while maintaining more than a magnitude better area density than that of FPGA.

"We see an ever increasing need for cost saving and demands for extending product life cycle," said H.P. Lin, President of Faraday Technology. "Our customers can enjoy accelerated development cycles and lower derivatives costs by adopting the winning combination of Faraday's 3MPCA technology, mass-production proven IP portfolios and state-of-the-art ASIC services," added Mr. Lin.

The 3MPCA can implement any type of combinational and sequential logics and it supports unlimited number of clock domains and gated clocks. "Easy-to-Use" is another important feature of Faraday 3MPCA; it uses existing ASIC design flow, so no additional CAD tool is required. For more information on Faraday's 3MPCA technology, please contact:

3MPCA Technology

The 3MPCA body is composed of a large number of basic blocks. Each block is capable of performing any combinational and sequential functions and comprises several Look-Up-Table (LUT) cells, driving cells, and storage elements. The 3MPCA boasts the best performance, lowest power consumption and class-leading area density on the market.

Features

• Core size range from 2,000 to 5 million ASIC gates
• Support unlimited clock domains and gated clocks
• Size and speed close to that of standard cell implementation
• Very low system power
• Built-in scan-chain
• No new investment regarding EDA tools and design flow is required

Benefits

• Radically drops overall NRE cost
• Pre-verified silicon ensures first-time working ASIC
• Offers complete IP portfolio – "design-to-silicon"
• Drastically reduces time-to-market by providing silicon-proven IP/cell library
• Significantly lowers re-spin cost and wafer processing time
• Greatly improves design predictability

Availability

The 3MPCA is available today for UMC 0.35 ìm, 0.25 ìm, 0.18 ìm, 0.15 ìm and 0.13 ìm CMOS processes for ASIC and IP customers.

About Faraday Technology Corporation

Faraday Technology Corporation provides leading ASIC/SoC design services and production-proven IPs to customers ranging from system houses and IDMs to IC design houses. The company's broad portfolio of key IPs includes leading products such as RISC CPUs, 16/20/24-bit DSPs, USB 2.0, gigabit Ethernet, and Serial-ATA. Faraday's ASIC design services and IPs are widely used in PC peripherals, communication, and digital consumer products. With more than 460 employees and 2002 revenue of 96.2 million USD, Faraday is the largest fabless ASIC design service company in all Asia-Pacific. Headquartered in Hsinchu Taiwan, Faraday offers service and support branch offices around the world, including the U.S., Japan, Europe, and China. For more information on Faraday, please visit http://www.faraday.com.tw

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