The Electronic Design Automation Consortium (EDAC) is the international association of companies developing EDA tools, software, services, and semiconductor intellectual property. Founded in 1989, EDAC addresses issues of common concern to EDA vendors. While initial efforts were focused on trade shows, EDAC efforts have expanded to include many areas where cooperation benefits both the EDA industry and customers.

The EDA industry includes three large companies, some medium-sized companies, and a number of smaller companies. Combined, the three large companies have about a 70 percent market share, with each having a dominant position in at least one subcategory of EDA tools. This suggests many designers are using tools from multiple vendors, creating a best-in-class design flow based on each vendor’s strengths.

Much of EDAC’s work is done by the operating committees, which consist of experts from member companies who dedicate part of their time to serve the overall good of the industry.

Working for fair competition

One of the more active EDAC committees is Anti-Piracy. Not long ago, it was the “collective wisdom” of the industry that EDA software was too complex and required too much support for software piracy to be a significant issue. More recently, the industry began to see evidence that this might no longer be true. The EDAC Anti-Piracy Committee worked with various anti-piracy vendors to evaluate the impact of piracy on the EDA industry. The committee selected a representative sample of EDA software from a number of members for an in-depth analysis in an attempt to gain a clearer understanding of the impact of EDA software piracy.

They found that EDA software piracy rates are about the same as other software products and represent a significant impact on EDA vendors and their customers. A design house using a pirated version of one vendor’s software will not buy equivalent software from any of the vendors, regardless of the merits of the software. Furthermore, legitimate customers can find it difficult to compete against a design house with lower costs because they are not paying for their tools, resulting in decreased R&D budgets. Thus, pirating even a single EDA vendor’s tools affects the entire industry. This is a major area where cooperation amongst vendors helps each company compete fairly based on the merits of their products.

Roadmaps and segments

Other EDAC committees include the Interoperability Committee, which publishes an industry OS roadmap. Agreeing to support, at a minimum, a core subset of the available OSs and versions reduces development costs within EDA companies and decreases support costs in the customer’s development environment.

The EDAC Market Statistics Service (MSS) Committee publishes a quarterly report containing a detailed view of EDA industry revenue broken out by tool categories and geographic regions. Using revenue data collected confidentially from members and nonmembers, the MSS report (available by subscription) provides EDA companies, investment bankers, and analysts with a detailed look at trends in many areas of specialization within EDA.

These are just some examples of the work being done by EDAC to benefit the EDA industry, allowing members to focus on and deliver quality EDA tools.

Robert Gardner has been an executive director of the EDA Consortium since 2006 and an officer/member of the board for more than 14 years. He has more than 40 years of management, engineering, operations, and sales experience, and has held executive management positions at several EDA and semiconductor companies. He holds a BSEE from California Polytechnic State University, Pomona.

EDA Consortium 408-287-3322 www.edac.org