ECE1394: Technical Management of Modern IC Design

Course Details

Instructor:		Kostas Pagiamtzis
Course Time:		Mondays, 4-6pm, first lecture on January 9, 2012
Location:		BA2195
Prerequisite:		ECE1388 - VLSI Design Methodology
Course Grading:		Assignments (60%)
		Final Exam (40%)

Course Overview

This course was offered in the winter term of 2012 in the Dept. of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Toronto.

The course overviews the design process of intellectual property (IP) block components for modern integrated circuits (IC). Students will use 65nm CMOS in the assignments; however, the course content will be relevant to smaller geometries such as 22nm CMOS. We will design a custom SRAM block, which can be embedded into an FPGA or other integrated circuit. The SRAM block will be used as a vehicle to learn about the aspects of managing modern IC design. This course will focus on 1) the required tasks to design a robust circuit in a modern CMOS process, and 2) aspects of leading and managing the design, verification, layout, and characterization of an IP block.

Topics

Below is a list of topics from which the course material will be drawn. More or less emphasis will be given to the different topics based on class interest and feedback.

• SRAM fundamentals (for SRAM desgin to be used a vehicle for learning other topics)
• Yield analysis and die cost estimation
• Behavourial modeling, logic verification, and mixed-signal simulation and verification
• Leakage current and dynamic power consumption
• Timing verification across corners
• Statistical (local) variation simulation and analysis
• ESD and power-grid design
• Floorplanning, layout, and layout-dependent transistor effects
• Managing chip characterization
• Task management of large designs