Memoir Systems Unveils First Commercial Product--Renaissance 2X Embedded Memory IP

Visionary product addresses time-to-market, cost and risk issues associated with traditional 2-port, dual-port memory implementations

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Apr 02, 2012 -- Memoir Systems Inc., the Semiconductor Intellectual Property (SIP) provider that delivers breakthrough embedded memory performance, today announced the availability of its first commercial product family: Renaissance™ 2X. Based upon the company’s award-winning Algorithmic Memory® technology which creates new multiport embedded memories by combining algorithms with standard 1-port SRAM, Renaissance 2X brings a revolutionary approach to embedded memory development across the semiconductor industry. Renaissance 2X offers four separate memory generators: a 2 port (1R1W), a dual port (2RW), and specialty memories for 2Ror1W and 1RW1W.

Renaissance 2X eliminates the need to build multiple variants of dual-port and 2-port physical compilers based on the conventional 8-transistor memory bit cells for new process nodes. As a result, customers benefit from dramatically improved time-to-market and time-for-adoption of new process nodes, reduced development cost and maintenance effort, and lowered risk to build embedded multi-port memories. Furthermore, Renaissance 2X offers up to 30% increased clock speeds and up to 50% area and power savings over comparable industry-standard physical memory compilers.

Adam Kablanian, CEO of Memoir Systems noted: “Memoir’s overall vision with our Renaissance product family is to bring new life and an innovative approach to embedded memory design and development across the industry.”

Da Chuang, co-founder and COO said, “The technology platform that we have developed enables us not only to deliver revolutionary new products to memory architects and developers, but also to enable the semiconductor industry as a whole to change how it thinks about and develops embedded memory.”

Kablanian added, “A key part of our strategy is to work with foundries, IDMs (Integrated Device Manufacturers), library vendors, and third-party IP suppliers to make our technology available such that it sets a new standard on how memory products are developed. For far too long the memory industry has been weighed down with technology that has not kept pace with the evolution that has taken place in the SoC marketplace. Our goal with the Renaissance product platform is to turn the tide so that embedded memory development advances with the rest of the SoC industry and the continually changing semiconductor ecosystem.”

Perhaps the most fundamental change Renaissance 2X brings is that it eliminates the need for specialized 8-transistor bit cell development. While single-port memories use 6-transistor bit cells, traditional dual-port and 2-port memories require specialized 8-transistor bit cells. This requires extra effort to develop an additional set of physical compilers, and also necessitates extensive silicon validation and characterization. It also means maintaining several versions of these compilers for high density and high speed versions, and for several process variants. This results in development delays that affect process readiness because the dual-port and 2-port physical compilers can typically only be developed after the process becomes stable. This delays chip design starts on a new process node. In contrast, Renaissance 2X creates dual-port and 2-port memories by building on 1-port SRAM, thus obviating the need for 8-transistor dual-port and 2-port bit cells and avoiding the associated costs, risks and delays. Furthermore, since the new memories are constructed from IP which has been exhaustively formally verified, no further silicon verification is required.

With Renaissance 2X, Memoir Systems offers a compelling product that brings value to the entire semiconductor industry. Its benefits extend to ASIC providers, foundries, IDMs, and fabless semiconductor companies.

Pricing and Availability

Renaissance 2X Generators are available now and list pricing starts at $250K plus royalties.

About Renaissance 2X

Renaissance 2X is the first commercially-available product offering from Memoir Systems. Based on the company’s Algorithmic Memory technology, Renaissance 2X introduces a revolutionary approach to memory design by providing faster time to tape out chips on a new process node, significantly reducing area and power, increasing performance, providing application-optimized memories for a variety of usages, lowering total memory development and ownership cost, and reducing SoC design risk by eliminating the need for further silicon validation. Renaissance 2X offers four separate memory generators: a 2 port (1R1W), a dual port (2RW), and specialty memories for 2Ror1W and 1RW1W.

About Memoir Systems, Inc.

Memoir Systems, Inc. is a provider of breakthrough memory technology that is delivered as Semiconductor Intellectual Property (SIP). Memoir’s revolutionary approach to memory design shortens the time required to develop new memories, and can increase the performance of existing memory macros by up to 10X more Memory Operations Per Second (MOPS). Based on its award-winning Algorithmic Memory technology, the company’s Renaissance family of products provides drop-in replacements for existing embedded memory. The new memories offer increased performance or reduced area and power consumption without sacrificing performance. Memoir’s technology is process, node, and foundry independent, and integrates seamlessly into any existing SoC (ASICs, ASSPs, GPPs and FPGAs) design flow. Memoir Systems is based in Santa Clara, California and has additional research and development facilities located in Hyderabad, India and Yerevan, Armenia. For more information, visit www.memoir-systems.com .