by Daniel Nenni
Dr. Stanley Hyduke, founder and CEO of Aldec talks about how keeping pace with the evolution of FPGAs and listening to customers underpin the company’s success.
Tell us about Aldec
Aldec is a team of bright, self-driven individuals, all striving to contribute and be a part of the technological evolution. I formed the company in 1984 and today we remain a privately-owned EDA company with a user community of more than 35,000 engineers, more than 50 global partners and a portfolio of software- and hardware-based products.
We are seen by many in the industry as the FPGA verification company. While that certainly is a core capability, we cover the entire FPGA spectrum; from design entry, code linting, simulation and emulation, through to helping engineers create the reports needed for full lifecycle traceability and certification, and ending on FPGA prototyping.
We have very much grown up with the FPGA industry. For instance, Xilinx was also established in 1984. However, our ability to provide high-performance verification tools has always been a strength, as has our commitment to delivering greater efficiency. Coincidentally, both strengths were reflected in the name of our very first EDA tool, Standard Universal Simulator for Improved Engineering or SUSIE, in 1985.
Over the years we have certainly kept pace with how different industry sectors have been utilizing FPGAs. For instance, the use of FPGAs for ASIC prototyping presented a great opportunity for us and led to us launching our first HES hardware, emulation, and prototyping solution. Combined with our software-based products for planning, requirements, linting and simulation, our HES products enable us to span the entire ASIC verification spectrum. Moreover, as FPGA complexity has increased – to the extent where we now have FPGA-based SoCs – the verification flow has much in common with that of an ASIC.