SANYO Selects CoWare N2C for the Creation of World's First ARM926-based Virtual Platform
SANTA CLARA, Calif. - January 23, 2002 - CoWare™, Inc. announced that SANYO Electric Co., Ltd., Semiconductor Company has started deployment of the CoWare N2C™ hardware-software co-design environment for ARM926EJ-S based System-on-Chip (SoC) platform creation. The system-level platform environment co-developed by CoWare and SANYO will let customers with multimedia applications begin developing software much earlier in their design cycle, before prototype silicon is available, resulting in dramatically-reduced design cycle times.
"SANYO is very impressed with the results of our initial evaluation, conducted by Takashi Yamada of the Sanyo Microelectronic Laboratory, to use CoWare platforms for reducing design turnaround time," stated Mr. Fumio Sando, General Manager, Marketing Division and Manager, System Business Division, SANYO Semiconductor Company. "We believe this capability will give us a strong competitive advantage in growing our ARM design based revenue. Using CoWare platforms, our customers can start software development much earlier in the design cycle and reduce their overall system design time."
Platforms created in CoWare N2C give software designers an early, accurate model of the hardware to develop, test, debug & profile the performance of their software, so they don't have to wait for the hardware prototype to start software development. In addition, CoWare N2C includes powerful Interface Synthesis™ capabilities that automatically generate the software interfaces to the hardware using a clear, unambiguous Applications Programming Interface (API). This API consists of software files detailing the platform's memory map and software drivers and automated assistance to build the software image and compile it onto the platform. This means that the software designer doesn't need to understand the details of the low-level driver routines and the design process is significantly faster, allowing software development that can start much earlier in the design process before a chip prototype is available.
"By using the system level platform environment jointly developed with CoWare, our customers developing multimedia and other applications can begin their embedded software development far earlier in the design cycle. As a result of using this virtual platform, the amount of time required for embedded software development for SOCs can be dramatically reduced," said Toru Watanabe, manager at the SANYO Semiconductor Company System Micro Business Unit.
"Since last year, our ARM9-based business has been gaining a great deal of momentum, and we have been making new plans for mobile applications like digital still cameras and wireless terminals. Based upon this response from the market, we have become confident that our ARM core-based system LSI business will become key for SANYO's semiconductor business this year. This type of LSI requires very fast development cycles, and there are requirements for derivative designs to be developed at the same time, which mandate the use of a design methodology incorporating the usage of a virtual platform. We believe that the CoWare solution will offer our customers the promise of shortened development times from the planning stage and beyond," said Hiroshi Koyama, Tokyo Technology Center Director, SANYO Semicon Device Co., Ltd.
"The biggest benefit of this design platform is its ability to speed the design process for SANYO's customers," stated CoWare President and CEO Guido Arnout. "We believe customers will find this very attractive and that this platform will help SANYO quickly secure new ARM business. We're proud to work closely with Sanyo and provide support for ARM's new multi-layer, multi-master AHB bus protocols with our Interface Synthesis technology."
About SANYO Semiconductor Company
SANYO Semiconductor Company is one of the five companies consisting SANYO Electric Co., Ltd. The company offers semiconductor devices, flat panel displays and system solutions for leading applications in electronic industry such as mobile communication equipment, PC/PC related products and analog/digital AV equipment. As for manufacturing fabs, there are three wafer fabs and five assembly fabs in Japan and six assembly fabs in Asia-Pacific region. Sales bases of the company are located in North America, Europe, Asia and Japan. In the fiscal year 2000 (as of March 2001) the company achieved 407 billion yens with about 15,000 employees including its subsidiaries. Further information is available at http://www.semic.sanyo.co.jp/index_e.htm
About CoWare
CoWare, Inc., provides tools and methodologies that help engineering teams cut their system-on-a-chip design times in half. CoWare N2C provides an efficient means to capture, analyze, and implement a system specification, with parallel development by hardware and software teams. In addition, CoWare N2C greatly enhances IP re-use and selection, further reducing design time. The CoWare N2C software is employed by major systems and semiconductor companies including Alcatel, Canon, Fujitsu, Matsushita, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Nokia, Sanyo, Sony and STMicroelectronics. For more information, visit www.CoWare.com.
Contact:
Mindy Powers - CoWare, Inc.
408.845.7613
mindy@CoWare.com
Paula Jones - New Ideas in Communications for CoWare
650.967.3711
paula@newiic.com
Douglas Yarrington - CoWare K.K.
+81-3-3780-7055
douglas@CoWare.com
