Virtual Silicon embraces free-libraries model

Virtual Silicon embraces free-libraries model
By Michael Santarini, EE Times
February 7, 2000 (10:10 a.m. EST)
URL: http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20000207S0008

Once an opponent of the "libraries-for-free" royalty model introduced over a year ago by competitor Artisan Components, library vendor Virtual Silicon Technology is now embracing the idea and has stepped up efforts to be first on the block with a 0.15-micron library customized for the United Microelectronics Corp. L150 process. The company announced late last month that it is now shipping 0.15-micron components to its worldwide OEMs.

Taylor Scanlon, president and chief executive officer at Virtual Silicon, said the company has adapted to the new business model and now chiefly creates custom libraries, its eSilicon family, for foundries like UMC. The eSilicon family of embedded semiconductor components includes foundry-specific standard-cell libraries, advanced I/O pads, phase-locked loops and several memory compilers.

"We plan to expand this new family of eSilicon embedded components to additional foundries and integrated device manufac turers throughout the coming year," said Scanlon. He said that Virtual Silicon and UMC have already processed a test chip to ensure the quality of new embedded components. Scanlon added that Virtual Silicon is still offering its Passport libraries to some customers but that it is largely focused on the custom market.

The free-libraries royalty model initially took much of the library industry by surprise when Artisan rolled it out a year and a half ago. Before then, library vendors drew revenue from several sources, including up-front fees from foundries for developing libraries, licensing fees and, sometimes, royalties from end users.

In addition, library vendors were often in one of two camps. They either offered process-portable libraries that would allow a customer to move a design from one foundry to another, sometimes at the expense of performance, or they developed a custom library for each foundry.

So when Artisan, a vendor of customized and typically more expensive librarie s, introduced its library-for-free royalty model with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. in August of 1998, the move caught Virtual Silicon and many other startups by surprise. The scheme meant that end users would get custom libraries free, and the foundry would pay Artisan per-chip royalties.

The business model was great for users but started a year of attrition among library vendors. Many of the small companies, such as Duet Technologies, dropped out of the business; some large vendors, like Mentor Graphics Corp., sold off their library businesses.

Out of that turmoil, "the main message is that we have survived and have proven we are a serious player in this market," said Scanlon.

Virtual Silicon's eSi/8 standard-cell library and the eSiPads I/O pad set are available now. ESiRAM and eSiROM compilers will be made available throughout the first quarter.

Virtual Silicon will develop and deliver UMC's Open Architecture Developers' Kits to customers, design houses, intel lectual-property suppliers and other library vendors for extending the Virtual Silicon library offering with additional standard cells and advanced I/O cores. See www.umc.com or www.virtual-silicon.com.