There's often a slowdown in electronic design automation news during the summer, but this year, the acquisitions just keep on coming. With Cadence Design Systems Inc.'s recent purchase of Verplex, and Synopsys Inc.'s purchase of InnoLogic, one might again raise the question of whether the big EDA vendors still know how to develop their own technology.

Cadence in particular has developed a strategy of technology growth through acquisitions-around 50, in fact, since ECAD and SDA merged to form Cadence in 1988. It's been a while since Cadence's own R&D team developed a market-leading product. But Cadence has made some very astute acquisitions, such as the purchase of Silicon Perspective Corp. (SPC) and its First Encounter floor planner.

Synopsys has taken more of a mixed approach. The company internally developed tools such as the PrimeTime timing analyzer, Physical Compiler synthesizer, Magellan verification solution, Formality formal equivalence checker and DesignWare intellectual-property library. Synopsys has used acquisitions to supplement its core technology. InnoLogic, for example, adds memory and I/O verification to Formality.

The downside of acquiring technology, however, is that you have to integrate it. Acquired tools don't have the same database or look and feel the same as internally developed tools. With companies like Get2Chip, Verplex, SPC, Plato and Simplex under its belt, Cadence has a lot of good technology, but putting it all into one consistent flow has to be a challenge.

The other problem is that acquired companies usually have technology that overlaps with something you already have. A case in point is Avanti's Chrysalis equivalence checker, a direct competitor to Formality. Now Synopsys is winding down Chrysalis and moving customers to Formality.

Since some of the best EDA technology comes from small, focused companies, it would be foolish for the big EDA vendors to develop everything from scratch. Still, technology development should not be completely outsourced. Sometimes there's just no substitute for in-house expertise.

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