SiliconAid Solutions, PLX Technology Partner on IEEE P1687-, IEEE 1149.1-2013-Based Test Development

AUSTIN, Texas - September 5, 2013 - SiliconAid Solutions, a privately held corporation and leader in chip-focused IEEE JTAG solutions and design for test (DFT) services, and PLX Technology, Inc., the global leader in PCI Express® (PCIe®) silicon and software connectivity solutions enabling emerging data center architectures, today announced a partnership to further the development of the companies' solutions and the utilization of emerging IEEE JTAG-centric standards. 

"PLX has successfully worked with SiliconAid to take our PCI Express switch with a high-speed SerDes instrument through the P1687 flow," said Bala Ramakrishnan, PLX® manager for DFT.  "We are pleased that all the patterns we have tried have worked using the SiliconAid products and appreciate the level of support we received throughout this experience." 

Through its unique, industry-leading PCIe Gen3 switch technology, PLX is utilizing the emerging IEEE P1687 standard and leveraging the enhanced automation, reuse, and debug capabilities of embedded chip instruments.  PLX is using SiliconAid IEEE 1149.1-2013 and P1687 preliminary tool flows, becoming a key partner in the testing and verification of these advanced EDA products. 

In the past, a significant manual effort has been required to generate and then verify that embedded instruments were free of defects.  A custom test-bench had to be generated, via a custom or I2C interface to confirm that the instrument functioned properly.  There were not standard industry solutions available for this flow, which required even more manual effort and support concerns.  In addition, a separate flow had to be used to generate manufacturing tests for the ATE environment. 

PLX has been a user of the SiliconAid JTVTM tool, and with the addition of support for IEEE P1687 -- and the new IEEE 1149.1-2013 standards -- the flow for embedded instruments can now be automated and verified to be complaint. 

"SiliconAid Solutions is proud to partner with companies like PLX Technology that have complex internal instruments that the new standards are designed to address," said Jim Johnson, president and CTO, SiliconAid.  "Leveraging these new standards to improve reuse, automate the flow, and verify compliance will dramatically reduce the cost of test and verification. SiliconAid has made it a priority to continue to develop and enhance our existing tools to be the best in its class." 

About SiliconAid Solutions

SiliconAid Solutions, Inc. is recognized as a leading provider of Design for Test Consulting and for world class chip focused JTAG software solutions to validate, verify, and utilize IEEE JTAG related industry standards. SiliconAid has corporate headquarters located in Austin, Texas and was founded in 2001.  The Consulting Product Group has been recognized for comprehensive support of all standard EDA DFT solutions.  The exhaustive chip level validation, verification, and debug of IEEE JTAG compliant implementations is based on over 20 years of testing and thousands of designs from multiple satisfied worldwide semiconductor companies. 

In addition to IEEE JTAG Standards centric solutions, SiliconAid has been an ongoing significant contributor to the definitions of the emerging P1687 IJTAG standard and 1149.1 JTAG standards and extensions developing working solutions tracking the evolving standards documentation.  The P1687 and 1149.1 extensions are being created and standardized to expand the existing capabilities of JTAG standards, providing more support for transportable embedded IP and instruments. 

Further information about SiliconAid Solutions and its products can be found on the internet at www.siliconaid.com.