Mentor and Altera partner on DO-254

 BANGALORE, INDIA: Supporting the growing number of avionics and military applications requiring DO-254-certifiable components, Altera Corp. and Mentor Graphics Corp. announced that the companies are working together to develop tools and methodologies for use in creating DO-254-certifiable intellectual property (IP) that targets Altera’s FPGA and HardCopy ASIC solutions.

As part of this announcement, Mentor will join Altera’s DO-254 Global Partner Network in order to establish design and verification best practices for DO-254-certifiable IP development and integration flows.

 Under this initiative, Mentor will leverage its expertise and industry-leading design and verification solutions in the development of DO-254-certifiable IP. The primary tools in Mentor’s DO-254 suite include HDL Designer, Precision Synthesis, ModelSim, Questa, the 0-In suite of formal verification tools, and a new solution for automating requirements traceability.

Mentor also offers DO-254 compliance training, design methodology assessments, and consulting services, including a DO-254 Jumpstart package aimed at establishing advanced verification methodologies for DO-254 designs.

“DO-254-certifiable IP is a huge productivity gain for our customers who have to comply with the DO-254 standard,” said Amr El-Ashmawi, senior business unit manager of Altera’s military/aerospace market. “Now instead of having to reverse engineer or re-develop a commonly used component, companies can actually reap the productivity benefit of off-the-shelf certifiable networking and processor IP, with the confidence of knowing that it supports the design assurance needs of their flows and thus does not present a certification risk.”

Altera, through its DO-254 Global Partner Network, currently offers a safety-critical version of its Nios II embedded processor. The certification aspects of this core were developed by HCELL Engineering using Mentor tools.

Tammy Reeve, president of Patmos Engineering Services, a firm that acts as a certification authority under the guidance of the FAA, stated: “Dealing with COTS IP under the guidance of DO-254 has been one of the industry’s biggest challenges to date. I’m excited to see vendors like Altera and Mentor taking the initiative to address a very important aspect of these flows to make COTS IP compliant with DO-254. Their efforts could save hardware applicants a lot of resources and frustration.”

“Working with Altera on DO-254-certifiable IP is the next step for us in supporting the needs of this market,” said Michelle Lange, DO-254 program manager, Mentor Graphics. “Mentor recognized the importance of DO-254 at its inception and has been investing in solutions for DO-254 certification for several years. This initiative lets us leverage both our methodology expertise and tools to not only provide the industry with high-quality IP but also the tool and methodology guidance that many are seeking.”