Mentor launches unique, end-to-end Xpedition High-Density Advanced Packaging flow

Mentor, a Siemens business, today announced the industry’s most comprehensive and productive solution for advanced IC package design, the Xpedition® High-Density Advanced Packaging (HDAP) flow. This comprehensive end-to-end solution, from rapid prototyping to GDS signoff, combines the Mentor® Xpedition, HyperLynx®, and Calibre® technologies. The new Mentor IC package design flow delivers faster, higher-quality results compared to existing HDAP methodologies and technologies. The Xpedition HDAP design environment provides early, rapid and accurate “what-if” prototype evaluations in just hours versus days or weeks compared to existing tools and processes, enabling exploration and optimization of HDAP designs before detailed implementation.

With emerging advanced packaging technologies such as fan-out wafer-level packaging (FOWLP), the worlds of IC design and packaging design are converging. This presents unique challenges to existing traditional design methodologies, driving a demand for new efficient processes, methodologies and design tools. Existing tools are inefficient – often failing when designs get to manufacturing. Mentor has addressed this problem with a unique HDAP solution comprising multi-substrate integration prototyping, and detailed physical implementation with foundry/OSAT-level verification and signoff.

“FOWLP projects a staggering expected growth rate of 82% from 2015 to 2020,” states Jan Vardaman, president of TechSearch International, Inc. “However, FOWLP is disruptive to the traditional design and manufacturing supply chain, and as with other high-density advanced packaging technologies, is driving the need for the co-design of devices and packages, and new flows, such as the Mentor HDAP solution.”

Unique HDAP Integration, Prototyping, and Package Design Technologies

The new HDAP flow introduces two unique technologies. The first, the Xpedition Substrate Integrator tool, is a graphical, rapid virtual prototyping environment which explores and integrates heterogeneous ICs with interposers, packages and PCBs. It provides fast and predictable assembly prototyping of complete cross-domain substrate systems through a rule-based methodology for optimal connectivity, performance, and manufacturability. The second new technology is the Xpedition Package Designer tool, a complete HDAP design-to-mask-ready GDS output solution, which manages the physical implementation of the package. The Xpedition Package Designer tool leverages the built-in HyperLynx design rule checking (DRC) for detailed in-design checking before signoff, and the HyperLynx FAST3D package solver provides package model creation. Direct integration with the Calibre tool then provides process design kit (PDK) signoff.

Integrated HyperLynx® Technology for In-Design Checking

The Xpedition HDAP flow is integrated with two Mentor HyperLynx technologies for 3D signal integrity (SI) and power integrity (PI), and in-process design rule checking (DRC). Package designers can simulate SI/PI 3D models using the HyperLynx FAST 3D field solver for extraction and analysis. The HyperLynx DRC tool easily identifies and resolves substrate-level DRC errors, typically finding 80-90% of the problems before final tape-out and sign-off verification.

Calibre® 3DSTACK Technology

When integrated with the Xpedition Package Designer tool, the Calibre 3DSTACK technology provides 2.5D/3D package physical verification. IC package designers can perform signoff design rule checking (DRC) and layout-versus-schematic (LVS) checking of complete multi-die systems at any process node, without breaking current tool flows or requiring new data formats, significantly reducing time to tapeout.

OSAT Alliance Program

Mentor has also launched an outsourced assembly and test (OSAT) Alliance program, a global design and supply chain resource for fabless customers to ease the adoption of emerging HDAP technologies. The OSAT Alliance Program includes proven design flows, tool kits, and recommended best practices for verification and signoff processes to create HDAP projects with the highest-quality results.

“The new Xpedition HDAP solution from Mentor brings together proven, industry-leading technologies from Xpediton, HyperLynx, and Calibre,” stated A.J. Incorvaia, vice-president and general manager of the Mentor Board Systems Division. “Companies are looking for a proven focused solution for FOWLP that combines foundry and OSAT design and manufacturing signoff support. The Xpedition HDAP flow provides our customers with a unified design and verification environment for foundry sign-off-ready designs.”

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