Mentor and Globalfoundries partner

Globalfoundries will use the SmartFill facilities of the Calibre YieldEnhancer product to enable advanced fill techniques for 20nm manufacturing processes. The multi-layer fill analysis and cell-based fill generation capabilities of the SmartFill system help designers deal with complex fill interactions at advanced nodes with minimal impact on circuit performance. “At 20nm the fill strategy becomes much more sophisticated because it’s no longer just about planarity,” said Maq Mannan, director of PDK development at Globalfoundries. “Besides CMP-ECD issues, you have to consider a whole range of interrelated effects, such as etch, lithography, stress, rapid thermal annealing (RTA) and other issues essential to successful manufacturing. Calibre’s integrated fill analysis and cell-based approach makes fill more precise, while achieving target runtime and output file size.” “Precise fill capability is rapidly becoming one of the most critical aspects of design for manufacturing at advanced nodes, and designers need more sophisticated tools to make sure that fill is optimized to meet multiple requirements,” said Jean-Marie Brunet, director of product marketing for Calibre DFM at Mentor Graphics. “The combination of Globalfoundries design kits and the Calibre SmartFill product gives designers a solution that creates the exact amount, shape and location of fill, not only to ensure that layouts meet complex manufacturing requirements, but also to maintain their design intent.”