P&R engineers! Interested in saving (LOTS of) time in your tapeout schedules?

By Srinivas Velivala

As a P&R engineer, you probably spend lots of time 1) waiting for batch DRC runs to complete, 2) digging through hundreds or thousands of error results, most of which are irrelevant, 3) waiting for more batch DRC runs to verify fixes, 4) thinking about all the time you wasted reviewing irrelevant error results and waiting for batch DRC runs.

 What if…you could run signoff DRC right in the P&R environment, apply fixes, and immediately run incremental checking in the design window to verify the fix? Even for base and metal layers? Or…find and fix hotspot patterns, and apply other DFM optimizations? Maybe you need to verify IP integrations? How about quickly checking multiple fix options to determine which one is “best” for your layout? Perhaps you’re working in a new node, and rather than reading the DRM, you’d prefer to just apply a new rule to your layout, see what happens, and figure out how that rule will affect your design? Maybe, just maybe, you’re close to tapeout, and you have functional or timing shorts, or interface errors, that require manual ECO adjustments. Wouldn’t you like to fix that error in your P&R tool, then immediately verify the fix?

All of those scenarios, and more, are possible if you’re using the Calibre RealTime Digital interface. Calibre Realtime Digital is integrated with all major P&R tools, and provides direct calls to Calibre analysis engines running foundry-qualified signoff Calibre rule decks. These engines perform fast, incremental checking near shapes being edited, providing nearly instantaneous feedback on DRC violations and fix verification.

Companies like MaxLinear, Qualcomm, Inphi, and GLOBALFOUNDRIES are already using Calibre RealTime Digital in-design DRC to reduce their tapeout schedules by 2-4X while improving overall design quality. If that’s a result you’d like to take to your next review meeting, here are some technical papers that provide all the details:

• Tape out on time with on-demand signoff DRC in P&R
• MaxLinear and Calibre RealTime Digital: Faster signoff DRC convergence plus design optimization for manufacturability
• Qualcomm achieves faster signoff DRC convergence in P&R with Calibre RealTime Digital in-design DRC
• Inphi case study – Improving digital design productivity
• Fix DFM hotspots in P&R with Calibre sign-off confidence