Chris Lennard, John Wilson, Marino Strik
ARM, Mentor Graphics, and Philips Semiconductor

System-on-chip (SoC) platforms offer the chip industry the best chance yet of solving the multitude of productivity and verification problems inherent in creating SoC designs. In their initial incarnations, platform-based designs required a substantial amount of mundane work to transform an assortment of IP into a specific design—not to mention the resourceintensive and time-consuming tasks of setting up the tools and testbenches required to configure, verify, and optimize the design.

This article reviews the challenges of SoC platforms and how Mentor Graphics, ARM and Philips Semiconductor are addressing these challenges.