Clear Logic continues mimicry of Altera parts
By Craig Matsumoto, EE Times
Nov 24, 1999 (10:24 AM)
URL: eetimes.com
SAN JOSE, Calif. ? Undaunted by a recent lawsuit, Clear Logic Inc. is continuing its program of creating parts that mimic those of Altera Corp., and is introducing a part that replicates Altera's Flex 10K programmable logic device. Altera sued Clear Logic earlier this month and charged it with copying Altera technology. Clear Logic's latest part is the first of a new vertical-link architecture line which saves space and requires less laser power to cut the links that form logic circuits, the company said.
Clear Logic builds ASIC-like parts based on Altera architectures. Once a design is completed on an Altera part, Clear Logic is able to extract the bitstream and replicate the design in a laser-programmable array, using a push-button process that requires just a two-week turnaround with no engineering support.
Clear Logic's latest "laser-programmable logic device" (LPLD) is the CL10KA, which will be announced next week. The part aims to duplicate designs based on Altera's Flex 10K product line.
With the CL10KA, Clear Logic has moved its fuses to a vertical architecture, as opposed to fuses that run parallel to the die surface. That way, Clear Logic can place chip circuitry underneath the fuses ? company officials prefer the term "links" ? thus shrinking the die for a particular design.
The changed approach was necessary because the laser energy required to cut the previous fuses was 10 times stronger and would "spill over" the sides of the fuse, frying any circuits below. In addition, the old fuses had to be spaced far enough apart so that the laser would not cut neighboring fuses inadvertently.
With the vertical-link architecture, Clear Logic officials said their die size will be 40 percent of the Flex 10K size. By comparison, the company's first products were 73 percent of the size of comparable Altera parts.
Clear Logic's past product lines could be retrofitted for the vertical-link architecture, "but we're not going to spend time doing that," chief executive Al Huggins said. Instead, R&D will focus the new architecture on future products that will mimic the upper limits of Altera's product line, including that company's Apex million-gate devices.
The new architecture marks Clear Logic's chance to begin making inroads into the ASIC market. Few PLD designs actually get converted to full ASICs because their volumes are too low and mask costs are too high, Huggins said. But designs that go to volume are still more practical to implement on a non-programmable part.
To that end, Clear Logic will be presenting itself as the company that can implement that ASIC solution, encouraging customers to prototype with Altera parts and then come to Clear Logic for the equivalent of a gate-array conversion. "As we go up in gate count, say 30,000 gates and above, that absolutely happens for us," Huggins said.
Altera, which makes its own masked parts similar to gate-array conversions, filed suit against Clear Logic recently, claiming Clear Logic had "unlawfully appropriated Altera's registered mask-work technology in violation of the federal mask-work statute." Neither company is discussing details of the case.
Still, Huggins has no illusions about Clear Logic's muscling into the high-volume designs that remain the meat of ASIC turf.
"The guy who does millions and millions [of semiconductor unit volumes] is trying to get every penny out of the design" and would therefore stick with traditional ASICs, he said.
In the future Clear Logic plans to develop a process improvement that will cut design times to three days rather than two weeks. Clear Logic officials also want to start accepting bitstreams over the Web to create LPLDs; the current process has customers e-mailing the data. These technologies should be available next year, company officials said.
Clear Logic's first CL10KA device will be the 50,000-gate CL10K50V, a 3.3-volt part with 20 kbits of embedded SRAM. The device is intended to mimic the Altera EPF10K50V. It will be available in the first quarter of 2000 at $12.95 each in quantities of 1,000.
The 30,000-gate CL10K30A is expected to be available in May 2000, followed by the 100,000-gate CL10K100A during the summer.
++++++++++++++++
FYI Altera EPF1050V costs about $80, depending on the speed grade and packaging. IDT can hopefully turn the ClearLogic operations into a $$$ generator.
Jim |
