Accellera Systems Initiative Forms Portable Stimulus Working Group

Proposed standard to specify verification intent and behaviors reusable across multiple target platforms

Elk Grove, Calif., USA, February 11, 2015 - Accellera Systems Initiative (Accellera), the electronics industry organization focused on electronic design automation (EDA) and intellectual property (IP) standards, announced it has established a new working group with the charter to develop the electronic industry’s first standard for portable test and stimulus. When completed and adopted, this standard will enable a single specification that will be portable from IP to full system and across multiple target implementations.

The formation of the Portable Stimulus Working Group (PSWG), in accordance with Accellera procedures, follows a Proposed Working Group (PWG) activity that was open to industry input from May through December 2014. The PWG considered numerous aspects of the problem space, defined a list of more than 100 requirements for an appropriate solution, and recommended the establishment of a working group to develop a standard to meet as many of these requirements as feasible. A total of 37 individuals from 20 companies participated in the Portable Stimulus Proposed Working Group, representing semiconductor suppliers, systems houses, EDA vendors, and IP providers.

The Accellera Technical Committee Chair, Karen Pieper, has appointed Faris Khundakjie as Chair of the Portable Stimulus Working Group. The group will have a kick-off meeting March 5, 2015 to establish a mission statement, goals, milestones and roadmap, while developing a Design Objective Document based on the requirements provided by the Proposed Working Group. For more information about the group and to learn how to join and participate, visit http://www.accellera.org/activities/committees/portable_stimulus/.

“The wide range of companies involved in setting the requirements demonstrates how much interest both vendors and users have in this topic,” said Portable Stimulus Working Group Chair Faris Khundakjie. “I look forward to working with all members to deliver and deploy another successful specification from the industry’s leading standards organization.”

A supporting industry quote sheet is available upon request.

About Accellera Systems Initiative
Accellera Systems Initiative is an independent, not-for profit organization, dedicated to create, support, promote and advance system-level design, modeling and verification standards for use by the worldwide electronics industry. The organization accelerates standards development and as part of its ongoing partnership with the IEEE, its standards are contributed to the IEEE Standards Association for formal standardization and ongoing change control. For more information, please visit www.accellera.org. For membership information, please contact us.

INDUSTRY QUOTE SHEET - February 11, 2015

Agnisys

Agnisys is a full participant in the Portable Stimulus Specification Working Group because we want to enable semiconductor teams to automatically generate portable stimulus directly from a design specification and leverage it through the design and verification process. The portable stimulus idea is a further extension of the Automatic Register Verification (ARV) solution that Agnisys provides today, because ARV enables automatic generation and test of design registers using UVM verification environment generated from the register specification, which we are demonstrating at DVCon.

-- Anupam Bakshi, CEO, Agnisys, Inc.

Breker Verification Systems

It was clear from our active participation in the Proposed Working Group that the industry has a strong desire for portable stimulus and tests, including checks and coverage. As a pioneer in this space, Breker has joined Accellera and we are eager to help lead the Working Group to a solution that is portable from IP to full system and from simulation to silicon.

-- Adnan Hamid, CEO and co-founder of Breker Verification Systems, Inc.

Cadence Design Systems

The significant user participation in the proposed working group has clearly established the need to develop a Portable Stimulus standard. Cadence plans to continue its technology and product development in this area, as are other vendors, and we will actively participate in this user driven working group and spend the necessary time to develop a viable standard that benefits the industry.

-- Stan Krolikoski, Distinguished Engineer Cadence Design Systems

CVC

The concept of Portable Stimulus has been in the minds of many users with every company trying to do it in its own way. CVC, a pioneer in ASIC Design Verification consulting and training, is pleased to be associated with the new standard working group right from its inception. CVC has been a committed contributor to the early stage Proposed Working Group at Accellera during 2014. We are glad to see a working group being formed and hope to deploy it soon at a wider customer base.

-- Srinivasan Venkataramanan, Chief Technology Officer, CVC

Mentor Graphics Corporation

We are pleased Accellera initiated, on our request, the Portable Stimulus Proposed Working Group to explore a possible standards activity. We are happy this group of technology suppliers and consumers concluded a standards project should be initiated by Accellera. We remain as committed to seed this activity with relevant technology today as we were when we asked Accellera to explore this idea. Verification productivity remains a big issue and to address it with a Portable Stimulus standard will go a long way to promote improved test case reuse and further advances in stimulus creation methods.

-- Dennis Brophy, Director of Strategic Business Development, Mentor Graphics Corporation

Sonics
As the trusted leader in on-chip networks, Sonics understands the importance of providing customers with a robust validation strategy that is consistent from the early system architecture analysis stage through to SoC integration. SoC designers, particularly those who are building systems with heterogeneous processors and other streaming IP cores where traditional verification does not scale well, need a standard to capture performance and system connectivity characteristics. We are excited about the formation of Accellera’s PSWG and look forward to actively contributing to its specification.

-- Hervé Alexanian, Director of Engineering, Sonics

Synopsys
Synopsys has been working with Accellera since its inception and have been deeply involved in leading many working groups and technical subcommittees. We plan to participate in the Portable Test and Stimulus working group, and continue to lend our support to its activities as we collaborate with leading verification SoC teams.

-- Yatin Trivedi, Director of Standards and Interoperability Programs, Synopsys, Inc.