580:, which doesn't provide physical chips to its customers but merely facilitates the customer's development of chips by offering certain functional blocks. Typically, the customers are semiconductor companies or module developers with in-house semiconductor development. A company wishing to fabricate a complex device may license in the rights to use another company's well-tested functional blocks such as a
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Hard cores (or hard macros) are analog or digital IP cores whose function cannot be significantly modified by chip designers. These are generally defined as a lower-level physical description that is specific to a particular process technology. Hard cores usually offer better predictability of chip
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format, and it can be targeted to various technologies or different foundries to yield different implementations. The process of IP hardening is from soft core to generate re-usable hard (hardware) cores. A main advantage of such hard IP is its predictable characteristics as the IP has been
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The effort to harden soft IP requires employing the quality of the target technology, goals of design and the methodology. The hard IP has been proven in the target technology and application. E.g. the hard core in GDS II format is said to clean in DRC
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IP core developers and licensors range in size from individuals to multi-billion-dollar corporations. Developers, as well as their chip-making customers, are located throughout the world.
55:
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because less logic is required. Therefore, designs are smaller. Further, x86 leaders Intel and AMD heavily protect their processor designs' intellectual property and don't use this
393:'s process design rules. Therefore, hard cores delivered for one foundry's process cannot be easily ported to a different process or foundry. Merchant foundry operators (such as
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have caused a massive expansion in the number of IP cores available (almost 50 by 2019). This has helped to increase collaboration in developing secure and efficient designs.
756:
595:. Gartner Group estimated the total value of sales related to silicon intellectual property at US $ 1.5 billion in 2005 with annual growth expected around 30%.
512:"Hardwired" (as opposed to software programmable soft microprocessors described above) digital logic IP cores are also licensed for fixed functions such as
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The
Silicon IP industry has had stable growth for many years. The most successful Silicon IP companies, often referred to as the Star IP, include
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listing in the field of computer programming. A netlist gives the IP core vendor reasonable protection against reverse engineering. See also:
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More about IP hardening. An organization (which is set up by government) provides services of IP hardening and IP integration. In
Chinese.
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IP hardening is a process to re-use proven designs and generate fast time-to-market, low-risk-in-fabrication solutions to provide
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pre-implemented, while it offers flexibility of soft cores. It might come with a set of models for simulations for verification.
505:. Many of those interfaces require both digital logic and analog IP cores to drive and receive high speed, high voltage, or high
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The licensing and use of IP cores in chip design came into common practice in the 1990s. There were many licensors and also many
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320:. An IP core implemented as generic gates can be compiled for any process technology. A gate-level netlist is analogous to an
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as RTL permit chip designers to modify designs at the functional level, though many IP vendors offer no
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Open Source
Semiconductor Core Licensing, 25 Harvard Journal of Law & Technology 131 (2011)
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to another party or owned and used by a single party. The term comes from the licensing of the
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Article analyzing the law, technology and business of open source semiconductor cores
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880:"The relevance of open source intellectual property cores for the IoT development"
724:"The Future of Semiconductor Intellectual Property Architectural Blocks in Europe"
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for a semiconductor company where it licenses its technology to a customer as
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Both netlist and synthesizable cores are called soft cores since both allow a
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competing on the market. In 2013, the most widely licensed IP cores were from
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IP cores are also licensed for various peripheral controllers such as for
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382:, etc.) are provided to chip makers in transistor-layout format (such as
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755:. No. N/A. Peter Clark. European Business Press SA. Archived from
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such as C in the field of computer programming. IP cores delivered to
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representation of the IP's logical function implemented as generic
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Components licensed as modules in larger integrated circuit designs
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logic are generally distributed as hard cores. Hence, analog IP (
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http://www.eettaiwan.com/ART_8800406094_480102_AN_71148c3a.HTM
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timing performance and area for their particular technology.
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IP cores are also sometimes offered as generic gate-level
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607:(IP) (or Silicon intellectual property) of design cores.
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by its creator and is integrated into a larger design.
749:"Cadence breaks into top four in semi IP core ranking"
62:. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
643:has offered various soft cores, mostly written in
389:Low-level transistor layouts must obey the target
186:(FPGA) logic can use IP cores as building blocks.
807:IP hardening by eetTaiwan Dead link 2011 06 30
911:"design and publish core" (under LGPL Licence)
779:Intellectual Property for Integrated Circuits
442:, to 32-bit and 64-bit processors such as the
434:vary from small 8-bit processors, such as the
8:
576:. A company with such a business model is a
450:. Such processors form the "brains" of many
703:Integrated circuit layout design protection
326:integrated circuit layout design protection
777:Kiat Seng Yeo, Kim Tean Ng, Zhi Hui Kong
71:"Semiconductor intellectual property core"
122:Learn how and when to remove this message
651:. All of these cores are provided under
180:application-specific integrated circuits
174:that exists in the design. Designers of
140:semiconductor intellectual property core
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614:(DSP) is developed from soft cores of
154:is a reusable unit of logic, cell, or
677:List of semiconductor IP core vendors
550:List of semiconductor IP core vendors
7:
426:Many of the best known IP cores are
60:adding citations to reliable sources
855:. RISC-V Foundation. Archived from
18:Semiconductor intellectual property
663:. Since 2010, initiatives such as
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917:Free reference IP cores for FPGAs
297:or support for modified designs.
266:IP cores are commonly offered as
952:Semiconductor device fabrication
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853:"RISC-V Cores and SoC Overview"
747:Clark, Peter (April 23, 2014).
687:Semiconductor fabrication plant
162:of one party. IP cores can be
47:needs additional citations for
226:is comparable to the use of a
1:
829:"Licensing :: OpenCores"
653:free and open-source software
578:fabless semiconductor company
558:Silicon Intellectual Property
509:signals outside of the chip.
275:hardware description language
184:field-programmable gate array
942:Electronic design automation
781:, J. Ross Publishing, 2010
728:JRC Publications Repository
722:Tuomi, Ilkka (2009-12-04).
254:and behavior that has been
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657:GNU General Public License
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158:layout design that is the
524:encode/decode, and other
285:. These are analogous to
222:The use of an IP core in
612:digital signal processor
208:Imagination Technologies
884:Internet of Things blog
629:Layout Versus Schematic
210:(9% market share) and
937:Semiconductor IP cores
422:Licensed functionality
212:Cadence Design Systems
206:(13.9% market share),
202:(43.2% market share),
182:(ASIC) and systems of
698:Fabless manufacturing
605:Intellectual property
574:intellectual property
460:CISC instruction sets
456:RISC instruction sets
337:placement and routing
240:printed circuit board
214:(5.1% market share).
160:intellectual property
635:Free and open-source
625:Design rule checking
448:RISC-V architectures
246:component of design
232:computer programming
56:improve this article
639:Since around 2000,
454:. They are usually
428:soft microprocessor
417:Sources of IP cores
304:. The netlist is a
287:low-level languages
242:design. Each is a
878:Daunhauer, Denis.
803:2009-08-04 at the
528:functions such as
236:integrated circuit
156:integrated circuit
759:on August 2, 2014
661:BSD-like licenses
655:-license such as
516:audio decode, 3D
444:ARM architectures
218:Types of IP cores
136:electronic design
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947:Logic design
915:Altera cores
888:. Retrieved
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857:the original
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757:the original
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599:IP hardening
589:ARM Holdings
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458:rather than
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54:Please help
49:verification
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501:audio, and
495:LCD display
483:PCI Express
224:chip design
931:Categories
909:Open cores
886:. Deloitte
838:2019-11-14
733:2023-08-02
709:References
566:Silicon IP
548:See also:
470:for their
347:Hard cores
316:-specific
262:Soft cores
82:newspapers
890:8 October
863:8 October
693:Mask work
689:(foundry)
507:impedance
474:lines of
333:synthesis
252:interface
196:foundries
172:copyright
801:Archived
763:July 14,
671:See also
593:Synopsys
540:coding.
491:Ethernet
302:netlists
295:warranty
277:such as
256:verified
244:reusable
164:licensed
152:IP block
144:SIP core
649:Verilog
568:) is a
544:Vendors
538:Viterbi
403:Samsung
399:Fujitsu
391:foundry
314:process
279:Verilog
228:library
190:History
178:(SoC),
148:IP core
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364:SerDes
356:Analog
168:patent
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384:GDSII
310:gates
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103:JSTOR
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865:2019
783:ISBN
765:2014
647:and
645:VHDL
591:and
438:and
436:8051
380:PHYs
368:PLLs
358:and
283:VHDL
230:for
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659:or
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562:SIP
534:DCT
530:FFT
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518:GPU
514:MP3
503:USB
464:x86
446:or
440:PIC
395:IBM
376:ADC
372:DAC
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312:or
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