Oski Technology, an Expert in Formal Verification, Joins NVIDIA
October 8, 2021
by JONAH ALBEN
We are excited to announce that Oski Technology, a company specializing in formal verification methods, will be joining NVIDIA.
Modern processors pack tens of billions of transistors, tiny on/off switches connected by billions of microscopic pathways. A bug in a single transistor can prevent a chip from operating correctly, requiring costly revisions to fix.
Today, verification engineers rely on two very different methods to make sure bugs don’t make it into silicon — simulation and formal verification.
The first approach relies on millions of simulations that search for bugs, exercising corner cases in carefully designed tests.
Formal verification, Oski’s specialty, is a powerful alternative that uses mathematical analysis of a design instead of simulations to prove that a particular feature behaves correctly for all possible inputs.
Whereas simulation injects 1’s and 0’s into a design to test whether numbers are added properly, Oski’s approach formally verifies that “c = a + b.”
A Leading Role in Formal Verification
In the semiconductor industry, Oski is well known for its leading edge work in formal verification. Its founder, Vigyan Singhal, also founded Jasper Design Automation. Jasper’s software remains one of the most powerful software tools available for formal verification proofs. However, powerful tools require great expertise to be used successfully.
In 2005, Vigyan started Oski with the mission of applying the deep computer science of formal verification. Oski has since grown to become a well-recognized leader in the field and has been a valued partner to NVIDIA for more than 10 years.
An Office in a Rising Tech Hub
Oski has offices in San Jose, Budapest and Gurgaon. Most of its employees work in Gurgaon, a city of more than a million people less than 20 miles southeast of New Delhi. Recently renamed Gurugram, it’s the country’s second-largest tech hub, as well as an emerging center of finance and banking.
India is already home to NVIDIA’s largest group of employees outside the U.S., and the new Gurugram office will be NVIDIA’s fourth engineering office in India.
Raising the Bar for Innovation
As NVIDIA’s products have grown in complexity and scope, now spanning markets from gaming and data center computing to networking and autonomous vehicles, the importance of designing perfect first silicon has never been higher. And new autonomous machine applications where safety is the highest goal make verification vital.
With this acquisition, we have the opportunity to dramatically increase our investment in and commitment to formal verification strategies to achieve that goal.
Powerful verification methods directly enable more rapid innovation, and we are very excited to join forces with the Oski team to deliver even more amazing products for years to come.
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