PLATFORM SYSTEM-ON-CHIP DESIGN

System-on-Chip (SoC) design may involve the mixing on a single IC
a microprocessor core (e.g. ARM, MIPS), PCI bus interface, analog
components and numerous digital processing  functions.  Designers
are  increasingly  reusing significant   portions   of   previous
designs to reduce the time to market which generally  results  in
greater  revenue for the product.   Reuse of previous designs has
been occurring for decades.  Initially, only simple library cells
were implemented with reuse in mind and this continues today.  In
the past few years, major  functions  have  been  implemented  as
virtual  components.   Since  these  may  have  been developed by
designers in other companies, their reuse involves a  combination
of  effort  and  risk  in  a new design.  To minimize these, some
organizations are internally standardizing on a  set  of  virtual
components  and  any associated software to develop their own SoC
platform.  Using platform-based design allows the organization to
develop a complete SoC that is central to its product line.  Once
the SoC plaform is fully operational, derivative designs in which
only  a  few  virtual  components  are  added  or  dropped can be
accomplished rapidly.  Developing a complete SoC with ten or more
virtual   components  by  a  fixed  deadline  is  no  easy  task.
Designers may encounter business and legal problems in  obtaining
the  virtual components and may find that information is missing.
Developing a platform permits designers to overcome all of  these
uncertainties  without  risking  the  delay  of  a  product.  The
platform SoC  also  provides  software  developers  with  working
silicon  they  can use.  The organization can market the platform
SoC to customers as a demonstration of what can be done and  even
provide  the customers with the opportunity to commence their own
product  development  using  the  existing  SoC.   Whenever   the
customer  determines  that  it is worthwhile to have a derivative
design  customized  for  his  product  needs,  the  platform  SoC
designers  add  or  subtract a small number of virtual components
and revise the associated software.  The  derivative  design  can
likely   be  done  in  less  than  six  months  from  concept  to
production.