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EDA Must Extend Standards Further
By Dennis Brophy, Mentor Graphics -- Electronic News, 4/5/2004
Standards are the lynchpin in the electronics design process. The complex task of building, testing, and deploying advanced technology products requires a vast array of standards. Standards promote trade by removing technical barriers, encouraging new markets and economic growth. Standards surround us in our everyday life to the point that we often take them for granted. However, the proprietary interests of commerce, geopolitics, and regionalism have acted as an opposing force to standards, frequently to the disadvantage of the consumer and often in defiance of common sense.
Examples abound where proprietary exclusivity has stifled the potential for standards to forward the common good. The lack of standards for fire hydrant flanges, for example, had fatal consequences at one time because neighboring fire companies could not come to one another’s aid; their fire hoses would not fit their respective hydrant flanges. Even the mundane promotion of efficient trade was hindered by the lack of standards in railroad gauges, and the cost of manufacture and repair of rolling stock was increased by the use of custom-made nuts and bolts.
A big step toward increased standardization occurred in the mid-19th century with the advent of machine tools and measuring devices that could be created from drawings, or what we would call today, design specifications. By using specifications, multiple companies could manufacture interchangeable parts. These specifications became some of the first examples of modern-day standards. For example, in England, the Whitworth screw standard was rapidly gaining ground. These early standards represent the birth of the systems for standardization that the electronics design community uses today.
For example, returning to our discussion of railroad gauges, imagine a train that had to continually stop at different locations to unload and reload cargo onto another train of the appropriate gauge. EDA faced a similar problem. To solve the loading and unloading issue of different track gauges, the EDA community invented the electronic design interchange format (EDIF). Subsequently, standardized languages like VHDL -- very high-speed integrated circuit design language -- and Verilog have brought about the steady decline of EDIF usage.
The start of standards for electronics, specifically, is rooted in telegraphic, telephonic, and other communications standards. Fueled by the recognition of the value of standards gained during the industrial revolution, these led to the creation of the International Electro-Technical Commission (IEC) early in the 20th century. The influence of the IEC was further established through the ratification of an international treaty to institutionalize, protect, and promote standards by law. Hence, other standards developing organizations funneled their efforts into this body.
Design automation standards have been a part of this larger trend. From the IEEE, where many popular design automation standards gain initial international certification, a dual-logo process was recently ratified with the IEC, establishing an efficient process to confirm IEC standardization for IEEE standards. Accellera, a young industry consortium established to promote and underwrite the development of hardware design languages, promotes its work to the IEEE when completed. When the IEEE approves this work, these standards gain dual-logo international certification from the IEC. Out of the industrial revolution, the technological revolution continues to leverage the great legacy of standardization.
Standards Prove Their Value in EDA
Today, in the design of electronic devices, we realize that interchangeability, or what we call interoperability, is key. In turn, we have found that interoperability can only be satisfied by the presence of open, public standards.
There are several reasons for this. Some have to do with the nature of EDA itself. The market for EDA technology has rarely supported single-company solutions. The EDA market is characterized by an assemblage of many, small niche companies, each having a dominant market position in some area. Certainly we have not seen instances where all of the technologies in a single-source solution are best in class.
Because the pace of technological evolution is so fast, compliance to single-company solutions acts as a barrier to product innovation and is therefore undesirable. The absence of standards also limits the choice of vendors and alternative solutions because the cost to switch vendors is generally very high, which leads to increased long-term cost of ownership. Companies that commit to single-company solutions cannot leverage the existing skill sets of engineers versed in alternative tools because proprietary training does not easily translate to other solutions.
Standards reduce or eliminate these issues, however. Standards expand consumer choices in software vendors and reduce risk and cost of adoption because new technologies are based on these interoperable standards. For the developers of such technologies, standards both create and enlarge markets.
History has proven this time and again since the standardization of the Whitworth screw, and it remains true for EDA today. Consider the value of electronic design information. When EDIF gave way to VHDL and Verilog HDL, the value of design information increased. Its utility was further enhanced with the invention of design reuse methodologies and platform-based design techniques. New markets for electronics and the technologies used to build them emerged in the process. Suppliers and consumers both won.
Since standards, with interoperable data format and design language descriptions are key, EDA companies must actively promote the evolution, development, and introduction of standards that further improve interoperability. To do this, public standards must be embraced over competitive and exclusionary practices.
When one company claims standardization by offering access to private formats that permit the sharing of only a portion of information, there is no standardization value. On the contrary, a user-centric model to develop and implement standards is needed within the industry. EDA companies should consider history and then assume a corporate position that creates, embraces, and adopts standards for the mutual benefit of EDA users and vendors.
Standards are the foundation of the niche-market quality of EDA technology. To avoid feeling out of the loop, EDA vendors must also allocate donated employee time to manage IEEE, Accellera, VSIA, and other standards bodies because of the important role they play in electrical engineering and design.
Dennis Brophy is director of strategic business development at Mentor Graphics, and also serves as chair of EDA consortium Accellera.
