Formal, simulation, and AMBA verification IP combine to verify configurable powerline networking SoC

David Vincenzoni, R & D design manager, STMicroelectronics
Electronic Product Design & Test (November 21, 2013)

While wireless networking is a convenience, it is only valuable when it works. The HomePlug Broadband power line networking SoC is designed to enable networks over common power lines, extending the Internet to places where wireless networks cannot reach.

Such a product is subject to high schedule and cost pressures; we must constantly work to balance the development of cutting edge, differentiated capabilities with leveraging off-the-shelf, standard IP and interfaces and a myriad of peripherals.

By broadening our horizons and intermixing a formal analysis “app”, simulation, and assertion-based verification IP, my team and I obtained more complete results, faster and more efficiently than ever before. Some verification tasks naturally align with a given technology – for example, constrained random simulation is great for driving packet traffic and validating robustness to input noise, while formal is perfect for exhaustive analysis of complex logic and IP connectivity.

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