Agilent EEsof EDA MMIC Design Flow - Unique Value

A successful design does more than just meet specifications. When manufactured, especially in big quantities, variation in components and in manufacturing process parameters around nominal values can result in failure to meet specifications in many, if not most, final products. Design iterations and extra wafer runs therefore become necessary, but they take time and can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. Consequently, today’s advanced technology MMIC designs – especially those being used for high volume products - require the use of DFM techniques. Designs employing these techniques are less sensitive to process variation and result in first-pass success, as well as much higher yield; saving both time and money.

ADS "Design for Manufacturing" tools create robust designs with first pass success and high yield.

ADS features two unique solutions - Design of Experiments (DOE) and Yield Sensitivity Histograms (YSH) - both of which are designed to turn any standard design into a robust one by providing MMIC designers full insight into the circuit and interaction between its elements. The tools pinpoint any sensitive parts and sensitive matching networks in the design that may cause problems in yield. Designers then are able to fix the problems prior to production, resulting in robust, higher yield designs.

The DFM design technique yields higher performance and more consistent designs with high yield. As an example, in the graph on the left a DFM technique was used and yield was 100%. In the graph on the right, a standard design technique was employed. Resulting yield equaled 5%.

With today’s advanced technology, DFM techniques can no longer be bypassed. Instead, they must be utilized to the fullest, especially in high-volume products. An effective DFM process is not possible without the ADS DOE tool. Also required is the ADS Data-Display Post Processing capability which is used to extract and create YSHs, along with many other meaningful data.

ADS’unique DFM tools work like an x-ray machine. They pinpoint all sources of the design problem with yield and enable you to fix the design prior to fabrication.

Strategic partnerships with leading MMIC foundries demonstrate Agilent’s established leadership in MMIC design. These relationships ensure that more and more foundry processes support the complete MMIC design flow in ADS, including physical design. ADS tools and methodologies make it easy for foundries to add new processes as they come on-line, as well as to update existing design kits to support the latest ADS functionality.

Agilent EEsof EDA has more MMIC PDKs than any other EDA vendor in the market, providing designers the widest choice of foundries for MMIC design with the best availability and price/performance. Unlike other EDA vendor-created PDKs, Agilent’s PDKs are jointly created by both Agilent and the foundries. They are fully validated and regularly maintained and updated by the foundries. Consequently, designers always have access to the latest and most up to date foundry models that reflect the most recent foundry process.

An ever-growing list of major foundries supports the ADS complete MMIC design flow with continuously updated complete Design Kits.

Advanced Model Composer (AMC) is a patented ADS technology that enables both designers and their foundry of choice to create arbitrary passive structures and shapes with built in EM effects. The resulting compact models can be used for fast tuning and optimization, enabling the designer to converge on specified parameters in seconds. AMC technology brings the accuracy of EM simulation and the speed of analytical models into a single, user-defined, compact model. It has been well adopted by TriQuint foundry and is used in their design kits.

Power Amplifier (PA) verification to wireless standards plays an important role in the MMIC design flow using ADS. That’s because verification to wireless standards of large MMIC/RFIC chips, prior to manufacturing, has been a major barrier in the design flow. "Results accuracy" and "simulation speed" are the two main factors responsible for this barrier. Now, with the ADS Automatic Verification Modeling (AVM) technology and Wireless Verification solution, this barrier has been eliminated.

AVM is a new circuit/system co-simulation feature which builds on the P2D modeling and circuit envelope simulation capability in ADS. It offers a more automated methodology to build an additional level of model abstraction within Agilent Ptolemy and is used for fast wireless system verification. Using the "AVM or Fast Cosim" option to the Circuit Envelope simulator, MMIC designers can generate a model for the circuit that can be simulated much more efficiently and with very high accuracy, resulting in an efficient and accurate verification solution.

Without AVM, MMIC designers can not efficiently verify large MMICs or RFICs against wireless standards. ADS is the only EDA design software with a set of wireless verification tools accurate enough to provide True Circuit verification, prior to and post fabrication, to all wireless standards.

Check out this recent ADS example: MMIC PA Verification Using ADS Wireless Test Benches

PA verification to wireless standards is automated and very easy to use. Simply select the proper realistic wireless source, insert your circuit level PA and simulate.

The ADS Wireless Verification solution uses realistic input signals and test benches for all wireless standards (e.g., WiMAX, UWB and LTE). It is automated and very easy to use. The designer simply inserts the amp and simulates. When utilized, it helps designers not only test and verify their designs, but also get the most performance out of their circuits.

The ADS Wireless Verification solution uses the advanced AVM/Fast Co-simulation capability for a 100x simulation speed increase with highly accurate verification results. It can be modified for aerospace and defense applications by adding custom security and modulation capabilities.

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