GRENOBLE, France — Design & Reuse SARL (D&R) has become a partner of the Electronics Design, Technology and News (EDTN) online network, and will make its searchable online catalog of virtual components available through EDTN's Web site, according to an announcement planned for the 35th Design Automation Conference.

Links between EDTN's Web site and D&R's site are expected to be in place by the time the DAC exhibition opens on Monday.

D&R (Grenoble, France) said its catalog is growing rapidly, and now includes information about 1,400 separate cores that are available for licensing.

EDTN is a venture of CMP Media Inc. (Manhasset, N.Y.), the publisher of EE Times. CMP Media is also said to be negotiating to buy an equity stake of about 20 percent in D&R.

CMP Media's announcement of a hosting arrangement for D&R's online virtual component catalog follows a similar arrangement made by EE Times and Rapid, the Reusable Application Specific Intellectual Property Developers trade association, two weeks ago. Although the two catalogs will reside just a few "mouse-clicks" apart in cyberspace, there are currently no plans to merge the two. Rapid is expected to launch its virtual component catalog at DAC with about 200 component cores from about 30 companies.

The EDTN Web site, launched at DAC last year, is intended to be a one-stop Web site for electronic engineers. It has been created by a joint venture between CMP Media and Aspect Development Inc. (Mountain View, Calif.). It features aggregated news from CMP publications, application notes and briefings, design information from other EE-specific Internet sites and an online component database search engine called IC selector, operated by Aspect Development.

"The addition of Design & Reuse is an important step in our efforts to make the EDTN network the first stop for electronics professionals seeking information on the Web," said Girish Mhatre, vice president and group publisher of CMP Media's OEM Group. "D&R has a wealth of information on the fast-developing virtual component sector, and has a track record for the quick innovation and flexibility needed in an emerging business like intellectual property."

The coming together of EDTN and D&R could hasten the time when users will be expected to pay for searches of the D&R databases. Access to Aspect's IC selector service has a $295 annual subscription. Although D&R does not currently charge for searches of its databases, "it is our plan to do for IP cores what Aspect has done for ICs," said Gabriele Saucier, founder and president of D&R. "Eventually we want to move onto e-business." Rapid, a not-for-profit trade association, has pledged to keep searches of its database free.

As evidence of D&R's quick innovation, Saucier said D&R will announce at DAC an expansion of its online services with two additional catalogs: one on embedded software modules, and another on intellectual property services. "Like our original Yellow Pages devoted to intellectual property listings, these new services are designed to guide users of intellectual property in their search for products and services that support the design of ASICs, FPGAs and other programmable-logic devices."

D&R's original database of virtual components that are available for licensing now includes about 1,400 IP cores from over 100 providers, and has over 1,000 registered site users, Saucier said. "Nearly all IP cores have been reviewed by looking at the latest provider information during May and June of 1998, so you can rely on our data," she said. "Obsolete IP cores have been deleted, new ones have been added. The set of IP cores offered on the market seems to grow regularly and we expect this trend to go on for at least another year. Our prediction is that our Yellow Pages will contain 2,000 IP cores at the end of 98.

"The Embedded Software Yellow Pages, that complements nicely the IP Yellow Pages, is already a strong baby and it contains over 500 modules from over 100 providers," Saucier said. The Yellow Pages of IP services are only set up as a demonstration at this time. Butt 117 services from 54 providers have been recorded into that database, she said.

D&R offers free core
As a first demonstration of the collaboration, D&R and EDTN will demonstrate at DAC the downloading of a complete set of virtual component files for a core to implement 64-bit triple DES encryption. The fully working core, designed by D&R, is being made available free to anyone who wants to download it as a way to encourage individuals to experience D&R's services.

The files include a fully synthesizable register-transfer-level VHDL description of the DES algorithm; a simulatable model; a text description of the core; a synthesis script; an EDIF net-list mapped onto an Altera FLEX10K device; a place-and-route script; and test files. The EDIF net-list is the largest file, Saucier said, and requires 4 Mbytes. That can be reduced to 1-Mbyte by "zipping," and will then typically take about 5 minutes to download, Saucier said. "We aim to show that a user can obtain all the necessary data files from our site by giving away this valuable piece of IP," she said.