Triad Semiconductor's Mixed Signal Via-Configurable Array (VCA-1)

Triad Semiconductor provides Mixed Signal Via-Configurable ASIC solutions that enable rapid product development with lowered engineering costs, fabrication costs, and reduced risk.

Industry Background

Many of today's most exciting applications combine analog and digital processing: biomedical, consumer, industrial, automotive, audio, and sensor interfacing applications to name a few. Until now, mixed signal ASIC design has required time consuming, expensive, and risky full-custom (manual) layout.

Digital Structured ASICs are a proven and increasingly popular technology for enabling low-cost and low-risk digital-only semiconductor creation. Digital Structured ASICs predefine most of the layers of an IC with pre-placed logic gates and memory. The user's design is then configured and interconnected by customizing the last few metal layers of the IC process. This simplified design and manufacturing process yields the cost and risk benefits enjoyed by Digital Structured ASIC designers. Until now, these benefits have eluded analog IC designers with these designers still being strapped with expensive, time consuming, and high risk full-custom or manual layout.

The Triad Solution

Triad Semiconductor's revolutionary, patent pending Via-Configurable Array (VCA) technology, (Figure 1), brings the benefits of digital structured ASICs to analog and mixed-signal design. The VCA solution allows designers to create ICs with analog and digital circuitry on a single semiconductor with no full-custom layout required. Triad?s proprietary structured array of predefined digital and analog circuits is user configured by a single production tooling mask to result in a custom ASIC.