Design tool licence enables Silicon Valley startup

IMEC has spun-out its low power design tool technology for data and memory optimisation to Silicon Valley startup PowerEscape.

IMEC has spun-out its low power design tool technology for data and memory optimisation - also known as Atomium - to PowerEscape, a Silicon Valley startup founded by Dr Guido Arnout, President and CEO.

Effective immediately, companies interested in commercial deployment of IMEC's current memory analysis and optimisation techniques for low power should contact PowerEscape.

The technology was developed by IMEC to optimise algorithms, software and memory subsystems for lower power and improved performance in electronic devices such as digital audio, imaging, video and communications.

Devices like these, which manipulate massive amounts of data in a small footprint, are proliferating in consumer appliances, industrial applications and infrastructure equipment.

Because the vast majority of dynamic energy is consumed in the memory subsystem, it is important that any power optimisation tool addresses the performance and power implications of data transport and memory subsystem design.

IMEC and its industrial research partners have used IMEC's Atomium technology to develop low power devices in a wide range of applications such as digital audio, MPEG-4 and wireless communications.

These power optimisation projects have proven the technology's effectiveness - often reducing energy consumption by an order of magnitude while significantly boosting performance.

PowerEscape used the technology licensed from IMEC as the starting point for its new PowerEscape Analyzer product - introduced in a separate announcement today.

IMEC will continue its research in power-efficient design technologies such as optimisation of the memory hierarchy in single- and multiple-processor systems, automation of energy-saving loop transformations and the exploitation of concurrency and dynamism in applications.

Companies can have early access to new methods and tools years before they become commercially available by entering into a research agreement with IMEC.

"Given the vast experience and in-depth market knowledge of Guido Arnout, who is well known and well respected in the electronics and EDA industries as founder and Chairman of CoWare and cofounder and President of the Open SystemC Initiative (OSCI), we are confident that PowerEscape will be successful in taking this technology to market", said Rudy Lauwereins, Vice President of Design Technology for Integrated Information and Communication Systems Division, IMEC.

"Through PowerEscape, customers will have access to part of IMEC's memory optimisation technology with the benefits of support and service from a commercial tool vendor".

"IMEC has a proven track record as a pioneer in design methods and tools", said Guido Arnout.

"Their approach of pushing the state-of-the-art to its limits and then applying and calibrating their new findings in concrete development of multimedia and wireless applications - jointly with its industrial research partners - is and will remain a key ingredient of their success.

IMEC has consistently demonstrated practical solutions to real design challenges.

It is their mission to partner with tool companies such as PowerEscape to turn its technologies into robust and commercially supported products".

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