Cadence has qualified TSMC's internally-developed standard-cell, I/O and memory libraries with its Encounter platform and w ill offer them this month bundled free with Encounter. In a couple of months, Cadence will also offer TSMC-developed 90-nm memory cells with the RTL-to-GDSII design platform. The libraries come with a design-rule-check (DRC) deck and Spice models.

"W e are teaming up to accelerate time-to-volume in 90-nm design," said John Yue, vice president of technology at TSMC. "With Cadence we are now integrating the library with tools, methodolo gy and services — all through one distribution channel."

TSMC has already announced similar partnerships with Magma Design Automation Inc. and library vendor Virage Logic Corp. But Magma only offers the TSMC-developed standard-cell and I/O libraries, and Virage — which creates its own TSMC memory cells — distributes 90-nm TSMC-developed I/O and standard-cell libraries.

"As we move from 130 into 90 nanometer, one issue our customers and TSMC face is getting customers into volume silicon, which is where everybody makes money," said Penny Herscher, executive vice president at Cadence. "We have teamed up to provide a complete solution to the TSMC [foundry customer]."

TSMC hopes the move will make it easier for customers to adopt TSMC's 90-nm process, and Cadence hopes customers will buy its newest line of place-and-route software and perhaps extra design services to desig n with the new process.

While the agreement is not exclusive, TSMC said it does not plan to sign a similar agreement with Cadence's arch-competitor, Synopsys Inc.

Crossed allegiance

The pact seemingly undercuts both TSMC's and Cadence's separate "partnerships" with library vendor Artisan Components Inc. Artisan has become synonymous with TSMC libraries and has built its busines s largely on offering TSMC standard-cell and memory libraries free to TSMC customers. Artisan is paid a per-chip royalty by TSMC as silicon containing Artisan intellectual property comes off TSMC's fab line. TSMC then passes that royalty expense on to customers.

Virage Logic also offers TSMC memory cells via a similar agreement to TSMC customers. Now Cadence is offering TSMC-developed memory cells to compete with Virage's cells.

Both TSMC and Cadence declined to reveal the financial aspects of their agreement, but TSMC did say that the cost to TSMC and its customers would be the same whether they used the Cadence-distributed libraries or the Artisan- or Virage-developed libraries.

Cadence was quick to point out that the libraries will be c orrelated to Cadence's Encounter suite. But Cadence also has said that it will correlate its tools to Artisan-developed 90-nm libraries.

This seemingly throws into question which vendor customers should turn to for libraries. (TSMC, for its part, re mains neutral on which libraries customers select, as long as the end result is that customers use TSMC silicon.) Certainly, TSMC's 90-nm libraries are in the qualification stage and are ever-changing. One goal for users is to go with the library vendor that proves most adept at quickly and accurately implementing those changes.

Yue said that TSMC libraries go through a rigorous quality check, called TSMC 9000, and that the libraries are offered with the DRC deck and Spice models to ensure accuracy. The libraries also feature dual power threshold tuning, to account for power-requirement variations among different aspects of a given design.

Mark Templeton, Artisan's president and CEO, pointed out that TSMC has always had internal library develop ment but has lacked a viable distribution channel for its internally developed libraries. TSMC is growing that channel now. But Templeton said he doesn't see that as a serious threat to his business, because "Artisan has the largest customer base" and bec ause the library business itself is tough.

"The business is not just about user support," said Templeton. "You have to do distribution, updates and support — but then you still have to do a lot of chip yield improvement and lab work.

"Ther e is a lot to this business after the design is finished. You have to update things as the processes change. It will be interesting to see if these distributors understand the depth of that commitment."

'Different points'

Charlie Huan g, corporate vice president of IC solutions business development at Cadence, said the company does not see this as a competition with Artisan and Virage. "I think this is not one versus the other, in that different libraries tend to occupy different points in the power/timing/area/leakage/noise space," he said. "So what we offer today, in addition to a highly integrated solution and a worldwide channel and support, is more choice for the customers."

Yue said that the distribution agreement will give users a broader choice of library functions. "The Cadence agreement provides a broader availability for our customers and expands the trade-off for designers so they can pick and chose the library functions they want for their design," he said.

>e