In the News Business and technology news from the semiconductor and design tool industries.

In the News

* Mentor Graphics Corp. (Wilsonville, Ore.) and Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (San Jose) will integrate their DFT and synthesis products, enabling design engineers to insert test circuitry and start ATPG in conjunction with initial synthesis. The agreement integrates Mentor's Fastscan ATPG technology with one-pass scan insertion technology, available in the Cadence Buildgates synthesis software acquired in last month's merger with Ambit Design Systems. The combination will allow users to automatically output the files required to run the Fastscan tool for test generation during test synthesis, thereby allowing ATPG tests to become part of the single-pass test synthesis flow.

* Toshiba Corp. (Tokyo) and Iready Corp. (Santa Clara, Calif.) have completed codevelopment of a chip that facilitates the cost-efficient manufacture of electronic devices with built-in Internet capabilities, creating a foundation for a new category of networked devices. The new chip provides electronics manufacturers with an inexpensive means to build networking, e-mail, and Web browsing features into a wide range of consumer products, including televisions, DVD players, cellular phones, and pagers. Iready's Internet Tuner Internet-on-a-chip design incorporates Internet functions in semiconductor logic rather than software. The customizable ASIC core's scalable architecture and modular design offer support for all standard Internet networking, e-mail, and Web services.

* IBM Microelectronics (East Fishkill, N.Y.) is building standard, high-volume chips using its patented silicon-germanium manufacturing process. Several of the chips are designed as lower-cost direct replacements for gallium arsenide parts. IBM plans to use silicon germanium to capture opportunities for highly integrated, custom chips used in fast-growing communications applications.

* Xynetix Design Systems, Inc. (Fishers, N.Y.) is selling its PCB layout software business to Intercept Technology, Inc. (Atlanta). Intercept will acquire the source code and customer information for Xynetix's Encore PCB layout product, support the software for a minimum of three years, and offer customers a no-charge transition to the Intercept Pantheon Designer PCB layout software. The two companies will integrate Xynetix's EDAnavigator and EDAvalidator software with Intercept's Pantheon. EDAnavigator adds design planning and early analysis capabilities to the Pantheon design system, whereas EDAvalidator provides data validation between Pantheon and data from CAE or the bill of materials.

Movers and Shakers

* David Goldsworth is the new director of European operations at Xynetix Design Systems, Inc. (San Jose). A 14-year veteran of Mentor Graphics and a pioneer in the digital broadcast TV industry, he has extensive experience in European EDA sales and marketing. Dee Mehta has joined Xynetix as business development manager in the San Jose office. Most recently director of application engineers for Cadence's performance engineering business unit, he has additional experience in marketing and engineering management at Mentor Graphics and as a design engineer at IBM. Ron Odom is Xynetix's new western regional sales manager in San Jose. He was most recently Senior Account Manager at Cadence, and has additional experience at Cascade Design Automation and Viewlogic Systems.

Money Bits

* Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (San Jose) reported record revenues of $308.6 million for the third quarter of 1998. The acquisitions of Ambit Design Systems and Lucent Technologies' Bell Labs Design Automation Group for nearly $278 million, however, resulted in a diluted loss per share of $0.91 for the third quarter. Excluding the unusual items, third-quarter diluted earnings per share of $0.29 increased 21 percent over the third quarter of 1997. Software product revenue for the third quarter totaled $173.3 million, up 28 percent from 1997, and services revenue increased to $67.7 million, up 68 percent over the same period. Maintenance revenue for the third quarter was $67.6 million, an increase of 15 percent from 1997.

* Atmel Corp. (San Jose) reported third-quarter revenues of $273.8 million and net income of $4.1 million or $0.04 per share. Included in the third-quarter results are the operations of the Temic Semiconductor Group, which Atmel acquired in March. In last year's third quarter, the company's revenues were $240,050,000 and net income was $30,349,000 or $0.30 per share. Revenues for the second quarter of 1998 were $288,205,000 and net income, excluding the $70 million restructuring charge, was approximately zero.

* VLSI Technology, Inc. (San Jose) reported third-quarter revenues of $130.8 million, a decrease of 27.8 percent from $181.2 million for the same quarter one year ago and a decrease of 5.1 percent from the $137.8 million revenues in the second quarter of 1998. Net loss for the third quarter was $3.6 million or $0.08 per share, which includes both a pretax charge against earnings primarily associated with severance costs of $7.4 million and a gain of $0.8 million from the repurchase of some of the company's convertible subordinated notes. In the second quarter of 1998, the company reported net income of $6.5 million or $0.14 per share, of which $0.07 per share came from the sale of 20 percent of its holdings in Advanced RISC Machines.

* Rambus, Inc. (Mountain View, Calif.) saw fourth-quarter revenues of $9.7 million, up 24 percent over the same period last year, and 5 percent over the previous quarter. Revenues for the full fiscal year 1998 were $37.9 million, an increase of 46 percent over fiscal 1997. Fourth-quarter diluted earnings per share were $0.07, compared to $0.04 in the same period last year and $0.07 in the previous quarter. Diluted earnings per share for the full fiscal year 1998 were $0.28, compared to $0.09 for fiscal 1997. Rambus's cash balances increased to $88 million on Sept. 30, 1998, an increase of $4 million over the previous quarter.

* In the second quarter of fiscal 1999, net revenues of Applied Micro Circuits Corp. (San Diego) were $25.1 million, an increase of 38 percent over the $18.2 million reported in the second quarter of fiscal 1998. Net income for the second quarter of fiscal 1999 was $4.9 million, or $0.20 per share, compared with $2.9 million, or $0.16 per share, for the corresponding quarter of fiscal 1998.

To voice an opinion on this or any Integrated System Design article, please email your message to miker@isdmag.com.

integrated system design  December 1998