IC Design Minimizing Local Layout Effects
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Solution Overview
Problem
As semiconductor manufacturing processes are miniaturized, the local layout effect (LLE) in integrated circuits (ICs) becomes significant, affecting the performance of standard cells due to their peripheral structures, making it challenging to design ICs that minimize these effects while maintaining desired functionality.
Innovation Solution
A method and system for designing ICs that utilize a standard cell library, pre-placers, instance placers, routers, instance characterizers, and performance analyzers to place standard cells in a way that minimizes LLE by considering the physical characteristics influenced by peripheral layouts, and generating layout data that reduces LLE-causing structures and optimizes IC performance.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If standard cell instances are placed in arrays with reduced size to enable manufacturing process miniaturization, then manufacturing scalability is improved, but local layout effects increase and worsen IC performance
Solution Approach 1:
The pre-placer performs preliminary placement of standard cell instances before the main placement process. By pre-positioning instances and identifying potential LLE-causing structures in advance, the system can proactively adjust placements to avoid performance-degrading patterns while maintaining manufacturing scalability through continued miniaturization
2Area of stationary object
If standard cell instances are densely packed to reduce IC area, then area efficiency is improved, but local layout effects intensify and degrade performance
Solution Approach 1:
The system applies local quality by differentiating placement strategies based on local layout context. The pre-placer identifies specific regions where LLE is likely to occur and applies targeted placement adjustments in those local areas, rather than uniformly spacing all instances. This allows dense packing in regions where LLE is not problematic while maintaining performance in sensitive regions
3Productivity
If conventional placement methods are used without considering peripheral layout, then placement speed is improved, but LLE-causing structures are generated that worsen performance
Solution Approach 1:
The pre-placer performs preliminary placement actions that identify and mitigate potential LLE issues before the main placement algorithm executes. This preliminary step flags problematic patterns early, allowing the subsequent placement process to avoid generating LLE-causing structures while maintaining overall placement efficiency
Solution Approach 2:
The system incorporates feedback mechanisms where the pre-placer analyzes the evolving layout during placement and adjusts subsequent placement decisions based on identified LLE patterns. This feedback loop allows the placement algorithm to adapt in real-time, avoiding performance-degrading structures while maintaining placement speed through efficient heuristic guidance
Data Source
AI summary
A system and method of designing an integrated circuit (IC) by considering a local layout effect are provided. The method of designing an IC may place instances of pre-placement cells so as to decrease occurrence of a local layout effect (LLE) causing structure. The method may extract a context of an instance from a peripheral layout of each of the placed instances to estimate an LLE of the instance, thereby analyzing a performance of the IC.