Triad Semiconductor

Analog and Mixed Signal Agile ASIC™ Solutions

Analog and mixed signal ASIC design and manufacturing solutions.

Triad Semiconductor

Agile asic development

Proven Track Record

A decade of delivering mission critical ASIC solutions

defense industrial medical automotive consumer

10

Alternative IC Vendors

Standard Product

Catalog Offering

ASSP

CSSP

ASIC

OthersStandard Product FocusedASIC is a special caseChip must with mass appeal

Organized to share your IP with your competitors

Triad - Proudly ASIC Focused

ASIC-only.ASIC-cultureYour ASIC partnerYour IP VaultEmpowering you to differentiate in hardware

Experienced ASIC Design Team

Years of combined custom IC design experience600

ASIC Engineering Organization

Engineering TalentProject OrientedRigorous ProcessesBest-in-Class ToolsSecure InfrastructureSystem RedundancySpecification DrivenCompliance Exit CriteriaDesign for Test, Yield, ManufacturabilityTrue IP reuse culture

Triad’s Custom IC Engineering Group

25 IC Designers

Customers

Project Leaders [10]

IC Designers [15]

Project Admins [2]

Test Engineers [3]

Cad Engineer

Sys Admin

VP of Engineering

Triad’s ASIC Project Flow DiagramKick-Off Meeting

Initial Requirements & Specification

Specification Review

Digital Design

Analog Design

Digital Simulation

Analog Simulation

Initial Design Review (IDR)

Complete Block Design & Block Layout

Top Level Simulations

Critical Design Review (CDR)

Top Level Layout LVS/DRC Verification

Release to FoundryTape Out

Wafer Fabrication

Prototype Packaging

Test and IC Delivery

Package Requirements

Package Selection

I/O Requirements

Evaluation PCB Development

Bonding Diagram

1

Specification Development

Major Milestone

Customer Provided

Joint Effort

Triad Responsibility

Legend

1Highly recommended to hold kick-off meeting at Triad’s Winston-Salem NC HQ to quickly ramp the project.

Trusted Solutions Provider

Automotive

Medical

Industrial

Defense

Engineering OperationsMission Critical

Solutions

Supply Chain

Distribution Partner

SemiconductorFoundryPartners

Optimal solution throughout the entire supply chain

PackageAssembly Partners

Qualification Production Test Partners

Long Term Supply Commitment is

Core to Triad

Manufacturing Partner

Collectively, we have shipped over 2,000,000,000 ICs

Superior Supply ChainKnow-howRelationshipsSupply Chain Management & OptimizationMarket Introduction, RampHigh Volume

2B

Triad ASIC Solutions

ASIC FocusedASIC Design ExcellenceASIC QualityASIC Long-term Supply CommitmentASIC Manufacturing Partner

Your trusted analog and mixed signal ASIC design and manufacturing solutions provider.

Traditional Full Custom ASIC Challenges

Long development

Expensive development

Risky development

Difficult to make changes

ASIC

ASIC benefits and Agility…

Agile – fast, responsive

Rapid Development

Mitigated Risk

Change Management

Cost EffectiveAgile ASIC™

TS

Agile – Fast to Prototypes

Agile ASICs speed time to 1st Silicon by 3 months

9months

12months

Time to 1st Silicon

Agile ASIC Traditional

The Secret is getting from prototypes to production quickly

Most mixed signal designs need 1 to 2 re-spins to achieve production readiness

Fixing a Traditional ASIC is slow & difficult

Manual Rip Up

ManualLayout

Full Mask Fab

6+months

An Agile ASIC is Responsive

Agile ASICs modified quickly & easily

Manual Rip Up

ManualLayout

Full Mask Fab

6+months

Via-Only Place & Route

Via-Only Fab

1 to 1.5

months

Agile ASICs speed up time to 2nd Silicon by 5-6 months

An Agile ASIC is Fast & Responsive

• Year Faster to Market• Predictable Schedule & Cost• Future Proof• Major Program Savings

26V domain5V domain1.8V domain5V domain

ADC20-bit

HART Modem

1.8V Regulator Band Gap

HART PHY

Bias Generator

Control

Watchdog

Triad Agile ASIC™

Agile ASICs are High Performance

Agile ASICs are High Performance and Low Power

16 Bit ADC MCU

Low Noise TIAs

EEPROM

RAM

UARTDAC DACM

uxPLL

250µALow Power

Major architecture

changes

ViaOnly™Change

50% Power Reduction

Agile ASICs: High Performance Systems

14 Bit ADC

Digital Level

Shifters

TempSensor

Thermal Shutdown

VoltageReferences

3.0V LDO

2.8V LDO

1.2V LDO

1.8V LDO

1.2V Buck Regulator

500mA

1.8V Buck Regulator

150mA

Voltage Supervisor

Soft Start PMIC +Precision Analog

Power FabricIsolationSubstrate NoiseSystem NoiseShieldingDecouplingPower Domains

What is an Agile ASIC?

1 Full Custom Circuits

2 Overlaid with Routing Fabric**Fabric enlarged to show detail

3 ViaPath™ ViaOnly Place & Route Software

4 Design Configured with Vias

Agile ASICs start with full custom circuits

OpAmp OpAmp

Switch Array

Resistor Array

Capacitor Array

Logic Array

Agile ASIC Circuit

Regular, array based layout of resources• Proven performance• Predictable performance

Supports interdigitating of elements• Mitigates thermal gradient effects• Mitigates varying wafer effects

Spare resources carefully pre-planned• No difference in performance• Spares easily accessed by routing fabric

Via Configurable Routing Fabric

Patented Routing Fabric

Fabric made from two verticallyadjacent metal layers

Arranged as a grid of overlappingrouting tracks

Adjacent grids rotated 90 degreesto prevent long routing blockages

Interconnect & configuration accomplished with metal layers and vias.

Same interconnect method used in full-custom IC design.

Vias are low resistance resources ideal for connecting analog circuits

ViaPath™ - Via-Only Place & Route Software

• Analog Aware™ – Differential Routing– Twisted Pairs– Shielding– Power Routing– Power Domains– High Current Routing

• 10 years of constant improvement

Trusted – the US nuclear arsenal is Powered by ViaPath

Agile ASICs – Circuits plus Fabric = Tiles

Op Am

p

Op Am

pSwitc

h Arra

yRe

sisto

r Arra

y

Capa

citor

Arra

y

Logic

Arra

y

Via Configurable Tile

• Tightly coupled combination of circuits and routing fabric

• Fabric is manually added by full-custom IC designer for optimal performance

Fabric enlarged to show detail

Agile ASICs – Tiles Speed Assembly & Optimize Area

Tiles are designed with a focus on rapid chip assemblyand total area optimization

Configurable Tile

Circuits plus Fabric

Configurable TileCircuits plus

FabricConfigurable Tile

Circuits plus Fabric

Configurable Tile

Circuits plus Fabric

Configurable Tile

Circuits plus Fabric

Agile ASICs – Flexible Routing Control & Access

Configurable Tile

Full Custom Circuit

Black Box

KEEP OUT

White Box

Gray Box

Black Box

White BoxViaPath free to route through this area and use available circuits.

Grey BoxViaPath free to route through this area on unused tracks only. Don’t move used circuits or tracks. Don’t make use of unused resources.

Black BoxKeep out. Don’t route through this area nor use any resources.

Complete Agile ASICs Assembled in Days

Days

Triad’s Spectrum of Agile ASIC Solutions

Agile ASIC™

TS

100% Via Reconfigurable

FocusedAgile ASIC™

TS

Reconfigurability in Focused areas only

Full-Custom ASIC

TS

100% Full CustomCost, Size Optimized

Agile Response to Problems

ASIC functioned to spec

Failed In System

Output load off by 20x in the spec

And, Error replicated 28 times

Total rip-up required

Weekend• Schematics changed• Simulated

Hours

• ViaPath routed new circuit

4 Weeks

• ViaOnly single mask fabrication

6 Month Delay 1 Month Fix

Agile ASIC Rapid ResponseProblem

Agile Response to Problems

New Feature Request

After Tape Out!

Customer feared NRE upcharge

Anticipated large schedule hit

Scrap 1-mask only

Days• Schematic Capture, Simulation• ViaPath Place & Route

4 Weeks & Single Mask

• ViaOnly single mask fabrication

Major Cost & Time Savings

Agile ASIC Rapid ResponseProblem

How fast?

Kickoff to working siliconNew Agile ASICComplete mask set

60days

Triad Semiconductor Snapshot

HeadquartersWinston-Salem NCFabless semiconductor companyFounded 200253 Employees32 IC Design Professionals

Regional Sales Offices• West Palm FL• Knoxville TN• Dallas TX• Green Bay WI• Minneapolis MN• Saginaw MI• San Jose CA

Focus Design and manufacture of custom analog and mixed signal integrated circuits.

A rapid, low risk, cost optimized approach to mixed signal ASIC development.

Analog Aware™ place and route software that configures designs by placing vias in Triad’s patented routing fabric.

Mixed signal circuit design, simulation and analog synthesis of circuits created by ViaWizard™ generators.

Agile ASICs™ ViaPath™ ViaDesigner™ ViaWizards™Expert system software that generates Configurable IP (cIP™) from user specified parameters.

Differentiating Technology

Markets

Solutions

For highest volume applications .Full Custom ASIC

Re-configurability in focused areas of the design.Focused Agile ASIC

Entire ASIC is 100% re-configurability.Agile ASIC

Partnersdefense industrial medical automotive consumer

Fast-Full-Custom™

Ultimate Time to Market And Low Cost Solution