August 7th, 2019 – By: Ann Steffora Mutschler
Part one: Defining the digital twins concept; the trouble with models; the issue with the ecosystem.
‘Digital Twins’ are one of the new, fashionable key concepts for system developers, but do they fit with EDA? How many different types of engines do these twins run on – abstract simulation, signal-based RTL simulation, emulation, prototyping, actual silicon? What should the use models be called for digital twinning – like reproduction of bugs from silicon in emulation? Or optimising the implementation usage using data run safely in virtual and FPGA based prototyping? Semiconductor Engineering sat down to discuss these issues with Wade Smith, applications engineering manager for high frequency electromagnetics at Ansys; Dave Kelf, chief marketing officer at Breker; Frank Schirrmeister, senior group director of product management at Cadence; Jean-Marie Brunet, senior director of marketing for emulation at Mentor, a Siemens Business; Raik Brinkmann, CEO at OneSpin; and Marc Serughetti, senior director, product marketing, automotive verification solutions at Synopsys. Mike Gianfagna, vice president of marketing at eSilicon, also weighed in after the fact. What follows are excerpts of that discussion.