OCZ achieves first-pass silicon success with DesignWare IP and Synopsys professional services

USA: Synopsys Inc. announced that OCZ Technology Group Inc. (OCZ) has achieved first-pass silicon success for its NAND flash Vector SSD using Synopsys' DesignWare DDR2/3-Lite PHY, Embedded Memories, STAR Memory System solution and Professional Services.

Choosing Synopsys technology and services enabled OCZ to accelerate the completion of their project, meet their performance requirements and achieve first-pass silicon success with a production-ready design.

Targeting the high-end consumer market, the OCZ Vector SSD was designed to deliver superior sustained performance through its new, high-performance Indilinx Barefoot 3 flash controller supporting the SATA-3 protocol. For OCZ's design team to effectively focus on developing the Barefoot 3 controller while meeting their broader design goals, they needed reliable, silicon-proven IP, an integrated design flow and design expertise to augment their own. OCZ selected Synopsys' high-performance and area-optimized DDR2/3 PHY, embedded SRAMs and integrated memory test and repair solution.

To mitigate risks and accelerate the implementation process, OCZ deployed the Lynx Design System, an integrated RTL-to-GDSII block- and chip-level design environment with unique visualization capabilities for efficient design exploration and reporting of design status and trends.  In addition, Synopsys' design consultants worked closely with OCZ's engineers throughout the implementation of their chip, delivering expertise and advanced methodologies in IP integration, physical design, and physical verification that enabled OCZ to complete their implementation in less than six months.

"We were very focused on reducing schedule risk, which made it imperative that we partner with an established vendor like Synopsys that had the proven portfolio of IP, design flows and services that we needed," said Brian McMath, technical director at OCZ. "Of particular value to us was the DDR3 PHY integration expertise Synopsys Professional Services brought to the project. The combination of Synopsys' proven DesignWare IP, experienced design consultants and tapeout-proven Lynx Design System made it possible for us to achieve our performance goals while saving an estimated two months of schedule time.  The net result of our collaboration was that we got our product to market much faster than if we had done it on our own."

"Companies such as OCZ who develop innovative electronic products need design solutions they can rely on to mitigate project risks and meet tight time-to-market windows," said John Koeter, VP of marketing for IP and systems at Synopsys. "Synopsys invests heavily in developing high-quality DesignWare IP as well as providing tightly correlated tool flows and experienced design consultants so our customers can focus on the aspects of their design that differentiate them from the competition."