GLOBALFOUNDRIES' DRC+ Technology Wins DAC 2011 Best Paper

[Apoptosis]

GLOBALFOUNDRIES' DRC+ Technology Wins DAC 2011 Best Paper Award

Milpitas, Calif. - June 13, 2011 -At last week's 48th Design Automation Conference (DAC) in San Diego, Calif., GLOBALFOUNDRIES once again received accolades for its innovative DRC+ technology. In a ceremony Thursday, a global team of GLOBALFOUNDRIES researchers was presented with the DAC 2011 Best Paper Award for its User Track entry titled, "Pattern-based Physical Verification in the Design Flow."

This is the second year in a row that the DRC+ technology was recognized at DAC. At the 47th DAC in 2010, DRC+ was selected by conference exhibit attendees as the Best Overall New Product in the "Best of DAC" awards.

"It is an honor to once again see this unique technology recognized by our distinguished colleagues in the industry," said Luigi Capodieci, R&D fellow and DFM director at GLOBALFOUNDRIES. "The findings presented in this paper represent years of work by a global, cross-functional team of researchers. This continuous innovation is providing designers with increased visibility into potential manufacturability issues, and giving our customers the tools they need to ensure first-silicon success."

An industry first, DRC+ is GLOBALFOUNDRIES' silicon-validated solution to help customers accelerate time-to-volume for complex SoC designs at 28nm and beyond. The technique goes beyond standard Design Rule Checking (DRC) and uses two-dimensional shape-based pattern-matching to enable a 100-fold speed improvement in identifying complex manufacturing issues without sacrificing accuracy. Instead of restricting the flexibility of designers, the technique augments standard DRC by applying rapid two-dimensional shape-based pattern matching to identify problematic configurations that could be difficult to manufacture. The tool then returns specific feedback to designers on how to resolve these issues.

In the DAC 2011 paper, the researchers describe a new innovation to the DRC+ technology. DRC+ is now integrated in the implementation flow for avoidance, rather than being used in a check and then fixing activity later in the flow. This is possible because of the speed of DRC+ over model-based lithography simulation.

For additional information, watch the following video of Luigi Capodieci describing the innovations behind DRC+: http://www.globalfoundries.com/drcplus.

GLOBALFOUNDRIES at DAC

The GLOBALFOUNDRIES booth at DAC (#1517) featured members of the GLOBALSOLUTIONS ecosystem of partners involved in all aspects of design enablement and turnkey services, EDA, IP, mask operations and assembly and test solutions, as well as information about how the company is collaborating with customers to deliver products that span the diverse needs of the consumer, computing, communication, and industrial/automotive segments. GLOBALFOUNDRIES' innovative 28nm technologies offer longer battery life for mobile products with higher performance and lower cost, while providing the full entitlement of scaling from the 45/40nm node, with a 10-20% cost saving over HKMG solutions offered by other foundries. As with many of the company's other 300mm and 200mm solutions, this provides a value proposition unmatched in the foundry industry. For more details on GLOBALFOUNDRIES' DAC participation, visit: http://www.globalfoundries.com/dac2011.

ABOUT GLOBALFOUNDRIES

GLOBALFOUNDRIES is the world's first full-service semiconductor foundry with a truly global manufacturing and technology footprint. Launched in March 2009 through a partnership between AMD [NYSE: AMD] and the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC), GLOBALFOUNDRIES provides a unique combination of advanced technology, manufacturing excellence and global operations. With the integration of Chartered in January 2010, GLOBALFOUNDRIES significantly expanded its capacity and ability to provide best-in-class foundry services from mainstream to the leading edge. GLOBALFOUNDRIES is headquartered in Silicon Valley with manufacturing operations in Singapore, Germany, and a new leading-edge fab under construction in Saratoga County, New York. These sites are supported by a global network of R&D, design enablement, and customer support in Singapore, China, Taiwan, Japan, the United States, Germany, and the United Kingdom. For more information on GLOBALFOUNDRIES, visit http://www.globalfoundries.com.