Si2Â’s OpenPDK Coalition releases Open Process Specification v1.1

AUSTIN, USA: Si2 announced its OpenPDK Coalition has released the Open Process Specification v1.1. OPS, from Si2Â’s OpenPDK Coalition, contains all of the data elements that are necessary to automatically create a PDK in any EDA vendorÂ’s or company proprietary design flow.

The OPS standard is a formal grammar based on the widely-used W3C standard XSD.

“The company is looking forward to future enhancements to achieve the goal of streamlining our extensive PDK development process to cut costs and speed production time. OPS will considerably enhance communication/data exchange between partners, foundries and EDA vendors.”

OPS v1.0 was targeted at process producing companies (Foundries), to enable study and creation of eDRMs. Its first release was published in January 2013, to gather early feedback on completeness. Positive feedback and valuable suggestions have been rolled into version 1.1. OPS v1.1 is the first release targeted for consideration by EDA Vendors. It is complete enough to enable DRC, parameter extraction including the Si2 OPEX & technology file creation including the OpenAccess technology database.

OPS 1.1 new features include:

* Connectivity below M1.

* Manufacturing, DRC and layout DB grids.

* Improved enumerations for layers and layer derivations.

* Multi-patterning support in layers definition for advanced node pattern generation.

* Tool mapping/interfaces.

* A metal stack connectivity table than includes local interconnect usable by all tools.

* A default set of technology grid settings and optional sets of tool specific grid settings.

* Multi-patterning support.

* The OPS XSD provides an enumeration of the backward compatible versions it can be used with.

“"STMicroelectronics has provided a complete example implementation, a full Design Rules Manual example and its complete translation in OPS.xml format of the Open Process Specification to provide users the understanding of how to exploit the advantages of a single, formal, syntax for describing all of the information necessary to build a PDK," says Gilles Namur, Advanced Process Design Kit architect, STMicroelectronics.

"“We are looking forward to future enhancements to achieve the goal of streamlining our extensive PDK development process to cut costs and speed production time. We believe that OPS will considerably enhance communication/data exchange between partners, foundries and EDA vendors.”"