VLSI

VLSI

We, at ADCC Infotech offers end-to-end product design services in the embedded domain from concept-to-manufacturing under an ODM model with experience in multimedia products in Avionics, Automotive, Industrial and Medical.

ADCC Infotech’s solution includes system design, hardware and mechanical development, BSP and firmware development, Middleware integration, third party application integration, application development, testing and validation, production management and product cycle support. ADCC Infotech delivers value by customizing the platform, including HMI and mechanical enclosure and through an EN9100 certified process.

A VLSI device commonly known is the microcontroller. Before VLSI, most ICs had limited functions. An electronic circuit usually consists of a CPU, ROM, RAM and other peripherals on one board. VLSI lets IC designers add all of these into one chip. Let’s look into the back-story of VLSI development before going into specifics.


Advantages

The increase in density happens through multiple developments. Some of which would be a reduction in size, management in power consumption among others,

  • Reduces the size of circuits
  • Reduces the effective cost of the devices
  • Increases the operating speed of circuits
  • Requires less power than discrete components
  • Higher reliability
  • Occupies a relatively smaller area
  • Let’s look into the design basics to understand some of the basics of VLSI working.

Designing a VLSI IC

The design of a VLSI IC consists broadly of 2 parts. Front end design includes digital design using HDLs such as Verilog, VHDL, System Verilog and the like. It includes design verification through simulation and other verification techniques. The process includes designing, starting from gates to design for testability. Backend design comprises of CMOS library design and its characterization. It also covers physical design and fault simulation. The entire design procedure follows a step by step approach. The front end design steps would involve

Architecture Definition

Basic specifications like floating point units, which system to use, like reduced instruction set computer (RISC) or complex instruction set computer (CISC), number of ALU’s cache size etc.

Functional Design

Defines the major functional units of the system and hence facilitates the identification of interconnect requirements between units, the physical and electrical specifications of each unit.

Logic Design

Boolean expressions, control flow, word width, register allocation etc. are developed and the outcome is the register transfer level (RTL) description. HDLs implement the RTL description onto a system.