To: Patrick Macnamara who wrote (6050 ) 3/29/1999 5:06:00 PM From: Linda Kaplan Respond to of 6565
Headline: VLSI's Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping System Named EDN 1998 Innovation of the Year Finalist ====================================================================== SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--March 29, 1999--VLSI Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:VLSI) today announced its Velocity(TM) Rapid Silicon Prototyping (RSP) system has been selected by EDN Magazine technical editors as a finalist in the embedded computing category of the EDN 1998 Innovation of the Year Awards Competition. EDN Magazine's exclusive awards program is dedicated to honoring outstanding engineering products in the electronics industry. Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping Introduced in September 1998, VLSI's Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping design methodology charts an innovative course for the future of multimillion-transistor system-on-a-chip design techniques. Using Rapid Silicon Prototyping, engineers derive new custom ICs from real-world prototype ICs built up from reusable on-chip intellectual property. The reusable building block structure of the silicon prototype enables engineers to integrate additional IP into a final design or to "edit out" unneeded circuit features. Rapid Silicon Prototyping development systems integrate prototype ICs with board-level facilities for memory, debugging, communications, databus extensions and field programmable gate arrays. Engineering teams can then debug, test and verify a system-on-a-chip design, observing its behavior running actual software at or near real-time execution speeds. This significantly shortens development cycles and increases the probability that the resulting custom IC design will perform as specified when first samples come back from the fab. The VLSI Velocity initiative has received overwhelmingly favorable comment from IC industry observers as a significant breakthrough in narrowing the "design productivity gap" that holds IC designers back from taking full advantage of the benefits offered by today's deep-submicron chip manufacturing technologies. Velocity RSP7 Rapid Silicon Prototyping System The Velocity RSP7 Rapid Silicon Prototyping system is the first member of the Velocity family. Velocity RSP7 integrates a high-performance enhanced ARM7TDMI-based ASIC with board-level memory, a large capacity FPGA, communications ports, debugging connections, and off-chip extensibility of the AMBA buses. These features allow users to add and subtract logic blocks from the prototype ASIC to create production-ready custom silicon. Velocity RSP7 enables full-speed real-time analysis and debugging of hardware and concurrent software development. This is a low-cost alternative to more expensive and less robust emulation systems, and facilitates evaluation and validation of highly integrated solutions. For more information on VLSI's Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping design methodology, readers should contact velocity@vlsi.com or access the Velocity home page, www.vlsi.com/velocity. Winners of the 1998 Innovation of the Year Awards will be chosen by EDN's worldwide readers through an online ballot at the EDN Access web site, www.ednmag.com. Additional information on Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping appears on the web site. Winning products will be announced at a black-tie awards banquet on April 27, 1999 and in the May 13, 1999 issue of EDN. About VLSI Technology VLSI Technology, Inc. designs and manufactures custom and semi-custom integrated circuits for leading firms in the wireless communications, networking, consumer digital entertainment and advanced computing markets. VLSI's value proposition is based on full-service customer support, deep libraries of vertical market-focused IC intellectual property, unparalleled custom circuit design expertise enabled through the Velocity Rapid Silicon Prototyping design style, and one of the world's most flexible and efficient custom circuit manufacturing facilities in San Antonio, Texas. The Company is based in San Jose, California with 1998 revenues from continuing operations of $547.8 million, and approximately 2,200 employees worldwide. For more information, visit the VLSI homepage, www.vlsi.com. Velocity is a trademark of VLSI Technology, Inc. All other names and marks are the property of their respective holders. CONTACT: VLSI Technology Samer Bahou 408-474-5570 samer.bahou@vlsi.com KEYWORD: CALIFORNIA TEXAS INDUSTRY KEYWORD: COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS COMED PRODUCT KEY: VLSIFX Today's News On The Net - Business Wire's full file on the Internet with Hyperlinks to your home page. URL: businesswire.com Copyright 1999, Business Wire