International Business Machines Corporation

Sanjay Dubey

Vikas Agarwal

Gaurav Mittal

Saiful Islam

Asit S Ambekar

Ankit K Gheedia

Nikhil Kejriwal

Sankara Reddy S Kommareddi

The present invention generally provides a decoupling capacitor circuit that is configured to determine whether a decoupling capacitor is defective. Upon determining that the decoupling capacitor is defective, the decoupling capacitor circuit may disconnect the decoupling capacitor from both, a positive segment and a negative segment of a power grid. In some embodiments, the decoupling capacitor circuit may be configured to reconnect the decoupling capacitor to the power grid upon receiving a reset signal.

Isolating faulty decoupling capacitors

A system and method that uses a text-based script file to capture a circuit design and allows a circuit designer to manipulate the script file. The circuit designer can add, delete, or move components using various tags and commands that are stored in the script file. When the design is complete, or ready to be tested, the script file is processed creating a layout representation file that is readable by a graphics-based circuit design tool.

System and method for text based placement engine for custom circuit design

An integrated circuit (IC) includes power supply interconnects that couple to a power source. The integrated circuit includes electronic devices that perform desired functions and further includes decoupling capacitor circuits that provide noise reduction throughout the integrated circuit. In one embodiment, each decoupling capacitor circuit includes a decoupling capacitor and a switching circuit. The switching circuit connects the decoupling capacitor to the power supply interconnects during a connect mode when the switching circuit detects no substantial decoupling capacitor leakage. However, the switching circuit effectively disconnects the decoupling capacitor from the power supply interconnects during a disconnect mode when the switching circuit detects substantial decoupling capacitor leakage. The decoupling capacitor circuit self-initializes in the connect mode without external control signals and is thus self-contained. Because of the self-contained nature of the decoupling capacitor circuit, an integrated circuit may contain an array of decoupling capacitor circuits without expenditure of substantial chip real estate for respective decoupling capacitor control lines.

Method and apparatus for self-contained automatic decoupling capacitor switch-out in integrated circuits

An energy-saving circuit and method using charge equalization across complementary nodes reduces power consumption in memory circuits and other circuits such as wide multiplexers having complementary high-capacitance nodes. A change detection circuit detects a state change to be applied to the bitlines, and generates a pulse if a state change is to be applied. A pass gate connected between the nodes is activated in response to the pulse to equalize the charge on the bitlines. The driver circuit enable inputs are also delayed, so that the bitlines are not driven until after the charge has been equalized and the pass gate disabled. In one embodiment, the driver circuits are only enabled momentarily by a pulsed output of the change detector and keeper circuits are employed to retain the bitlines in their asserted states.

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Austin, TX, United States of America

Sanjay Dubey