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DAC Panel: Specialized FPGA tools needed to keep up with size and complexity

ANAHEIM, Calif. - A Pavilion Panel at DAC, entitled "Is the FPGA Tool Opportunity an Oasis or Mirage?" raised the question about the need for more specialized and sophisticated tools for FPGA design. The answer from the panelists was a resounding "yes".

The panel was smoothly moderated by FPGA Journal editor Kevin Morris and brought together a trio of experienced FPGA tool experts - representatives from Mentor Graphics (Simon Bloch), Synopsys (Andrew Dauman) and US Venture Partners (Jacques Benkoski). There was universal agreement that given the complexity of modern FPGAs, design tools must keep pace, especially in areas such as verification and synthesis.

The panelist acknowledged that the tools offered by the FPGA vendors themselves served users well for the first several generations of FPGA devices, but with those same silicon providers significantly improving their devices with each new generation, tool performance and efficiency needs a boost. They debated whether those tools should continue to come from the FPGA vendors themselves and again there was agreement that the likes of Xilinx and Altera need to focus on their core competence of the underlying ‘platform' or fabric of their devices, and that there was an opportunity for specialized tool suppliers to help address the growing challenges in the design flow for FPGAs.

The panel likened the current state of FPGA to the adolescent days of the ASIC industry when the first suppliers of those custom devices also offered their own tools, often for free. But as ASIC complexity and size increased, it became clear that more advanced tools were needed and this played a large role in the evolution of the modern EDA industry.

Similarly, the days of FPGA designers relying on free tools are numbered, especially at the high end of the market. "Free is a four-letter word that begins with F," joked USVP's Benkoski, emphasizing that, in the end, a free tool may be more costly to a design team or company if it causes longer design cycles or can't handle the complexity of a design.

The EDA suppliers agreed, noting that a commercial tool will almost always be a wiser investment for a high-end design project considering the breadth of use and testing it gets across multiple customers, and the fact that supporting an in-house tool is an overlooked cost and headache that many companies overlook.

At GateRocket we agree with this sentiment, having seen first hand the need for more powerful verification and more efficient debugging capabilities by FPGA designers. Our exclusive focus on FPGA verification and debug allows us to hone in on the specific issues FPGA designers face (remember our founder was an FPGA designer himself!) and develop solutions that are optimized for the unique requirements of today's most advanced FPGA devices.