Freescale Semiconductor,inc.

Vijay Tayal

Chetan Verma

Amit Roy

Amit Kumar Dey

Kulbhushan Misri

Zhihong Cheng

Nipun Mahajan

Himanshu Mangal

Ashis Maitra

Shyam S Gupta

Kushagra Khorwal

Harkaran Singh

Rounak Roy

A method of physical design of an IC using an EDA tool includes identifying elements of the IC design that have excess positive timing slack. The excess timing slack elements are placed in a separate partition and then parameters of the characteristics of the excess timing slack elements are modified to reduce their excess timing slack, such as reducing the voltage supplied to the separate partition, thereby lowering power consumption of the IC design.

System for partitioning integrated circuit design based on timing slack

A clock signal generator provides a gated clock signal GCLK to trigger operation of dual-edge triggered circuits. A first detector generates, while a clock gating signal /EN is asserted, a first detector output signal that is asserted or de-asserted as a function of disjunction or conjunction respectively of the values that an input clock signal CLK and the gated clock signal GCLK had when the clock gating signal /EN transitioned. A second detector generates, while the clock gating signal /EN is de-asserted, as the value of the gated clock signal GCLK, the value CLK or its complement /CLK as a function of the first detector output signal. When the clock gating signal /EN is asserted, the second detector maintains the value that the gated clock signal GCLK had when the clock gating signal /EN transitioned from de-asserted to asserted.

Dual-edge gated clock signal generator

A low power inverter circuit includes first and second transistors that receive an input signal at their gate terminals. The first and second transistors are connected by way of their source terminals to third and fourth transistors, respectively. The third and fourth transistors are connected in parallel with fifth and sixth transistors, respectively. The third and fourth transistors are continuously switched on, and the fifth and sixth transistors are controlled in such a way to reduce short circuit current flowing through the first and second transistors when the input signal transitions from one state to another.

Low power inverter circuit

A method and system for reducing power consumption of an integrated circuit with an EDA tool by analyzing and modifying a layout design having a plurality of nets across multiple metal layers. The method includes identifying long nets in the layout design, determining an interconnect capacitance of each of the long nets, determining a net level switching activity of each of the long nets, generating a high power impact list using the interconnect capacitance and the switching activity of each of the long nets, modifying a metal spacing of the long nets listed in the high power impact list.

System and method for reducing power consumption of integrated circuit

An on-chip timing slack monitor that measures timing slack at the end of a critical path includes a master-slave flip-flop having a tap on the Q output of the master and a logic module coupled to the flip-flop for producing a pulse whose width is a function of the slack. A pulse width shrinking delay line removes glitches on the flip-flop output and, in combination with a digital integrator and counter, also performs a time to digital conversion operation for determining a value for timing path slack. The determined value is used by a decision module for yield analysis. The monitor can discriminate a glitch from a slack pulse at the flip-flop output for any width of glitch up to one-half of a clock cycle.

Timing path slack monitoring system

Forward bulk biasing circuitry for PMOS and NMOS transistors is provided. The bulk biasing circuitry includes two N-type MOS transistors, two P-type MOS transistors, and two capacitors. The forward bias to a bulk terminal of a transistor increases a threshold voltage of a transistor, thereby reducing a transition time and improving the performance of the transistor. The forward bias is provided only when the transistor transitions from one state to another, thereby reducing leakage power dissipation during active and standby modes of an integrated circuit that includes the transistor.

MOS transistor with forward bulk-biasing circuit

A system and method for determining power leakage of an electronic circuit design that includes a plurality of digital logic elements, using an electronic design automation (EDA) tool that includes a processor and an automatic test pattern generation (ATPG) tool for generating multiple sets of input value strings. The ATPG tool generates test patterns that include input value strings for simulating each digital logic element of the circuit design independently. A mapping between generated output values and corresponding input values is stored in a look up table (LUT). Thereafter, the ATPG tool generates test patterns that include input value strings for simulating the real-time behavior of the circuit design. The processor determines power leakage of the circuit design based on probability of occurrence of each unique input value string at the input of each digital logic element and corresponding predetermined power leakage values.

System and method for determining power leakage of electronic circuit design

A system for reducing leakage power of an electronic circuit design, where the circuit design includes multiple timing paths, each timing path made up of multiple cells, using an electronic design automation (EDA) tool. The EDA tool includes a processor that chooses a first replacement cell for replacing a first cell in a first timing path when timing slack is not available in the first path, where a width and threshold voltage of the first replacement cell are greater than a width and threshold voltage of the first cell. The processor then replaces the first cell with the first replacement cell when the overall power consumption of the first replacement cell is less than that of the first cell, and when the timing slack is available for replacing the first cell with the first replacement cell.

System for reducing leakage power of electronic circuit

A method and system for reducing power consumption of an electronic circuit design using an EDA tool includes generating a look-up table (LUT) that stores a mapping between a type, a predetermined optimum power input transition time, and at least one characteristic corresponding to each digital logic element present in a cell library of the EDA tool. An input transition time of a first digital logic element is determined. Then, the first logic element is replaced with a second logic element if the input transition time and the predetermined optimum power input transition time of the first logic element are not equal. The second logic element may be replaced with a third logic element if a timing delay of the second logic element is greater than a timing delay of the first logic element.

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Vijay Tayal