Typically, people use the phrase “Rome wasn’t built in a day” to remind others that time is required to create something truly great. Now, what does this have to do with the Design Automation Conference? While it might seem like we held the 57th DAC just a few weeks ago, time doesn’t stand still. In fact, the 58th DAC team began laying bricks for next year’s event by holding its first kickoff meeting only three weeks after completing this year’s virtual event. And for the 58th DAC, I am truly... Read More
Members of RISC-V International will be delivering numerous presentations and hosting discussions and tutorials at the annual Design Automation Conference (DAC) 2020, taking place from Monday, July 20 through Friday, July 24, showcasing RISC-V’s incredible momentum since its inception ten years ago at the University of California, Berkeley. The presentations, discussions and tutorials will focus on new and exciting developments and implementations from the RISC-V community, spotlighting... Read More
What are designers keenly interested in as the 57th Design Automation Conference (DAC) approaches? If you said machine learning (ML), you’d be only partially right. Based on designer and IP tracks submissions to the 57th edition of the venerable electronics-industry event, ML – how to design with it and optimize EDA tools and flows using it – is a hot topic. But so too are more traditional avenues of exploration for practicing designers, such as physical design, abstraction, verification,... Read More
By Zhuo Li, 57th DAC General Chair, and Harry Foster, 57th DAC Vice ChairAs the industry heads deeper into 2020, it’s obvious that the research and application of AI/ML architectures and solutions will continue to accelerate. In fact, a simple metric to support this claim can be measured by examining the number of AI/ML architecture and system design papers that were recently submitted for review to the 2020 Design Automation Conference (DAC). In 2018, 56 AI/ML architecture and system... Read More
As security defenses in the software layer become increasingly more complex and secure, malicious agents have been searching for alternative attack vectors to bypass these defenses, such as hardware vulnerabilities. By exploiting these hardware vulnerabilities, attackers can circumvent software security measures. Given this new threat, the hardware industry is researching ways to fortify its security defenses, but there is a major problem: Lack of security engineers. Traditionally, universities... Read More
It is four weeks to DAC! At this point you should be deep into your planning and ready to drop down secure all your exhibit services before the deadline.While you are thinking about how to manage all the details of getting your booth on the show floor, this is a great time to take a step back and make sure you have clearly defined exhibit “takeaways” -- think “goals” and “how you measure success”. They could be through key customer engagements, new contacts/logos, and/or conversations with... Read More
The Design Automation Conference (DAC), which was founded in 1964, is the longest running and largest conference focused on the design and automation of electronic circuits and systems. And 2019 was a record year in terms of research paper submissions and accepted papers. In fact, this year DAC experienced an impressive 18 percent increase in submissions, as shown in Figure 1.Figure 1. DAC growth in research paper submissionsOf this year’s 815 submissions that were stringently reviewed, 202... Read More
The beauty of the Design Automation Conference is that it is always the same and never the same. There is no technical conference like it. Every year there is the Technical Program, the Designer Track, IP Track and the Exhibition. And the networking opportunities with customers and colleagues is second to none. But each year is different, and I want to share what I see are the exciting new opportunities with DAC this year.First DAC will be in Las Vegas and the conference hasn’t been there since... Read More
2018 marked the first year of the Design Infrastructure Alley (DIA) at DAC. It was the first time that DAC devoted floorspace to discussing the unique IT needs of the semiconductor industry.Some of the big issues we are looking to address at DAC include:Increased Focus on Data/IP SecuritySemiconductor companies have traditionally had a very open, collegial way of working. The emphasis was on making it easy for engineers to collaborate. This was generally fine when companies created and owned... Read More
By Rob Oshana, 56th DAC Designer Track Co-Chair If the Research Track is the soul of the Design Automation Conference, the Designer Track is its beating heart. And as we’ve seen in recent years, that heart beat is only getting stronger. I’m so excited to be the co-chair for the Designer Track for the 56th DAC because it’s really where the rubber meets the road for systems designers, where deep and fruitful conversations happen between presenters and audience members and where the near... Read More
The spots are limited and boards are provided as first come first servedInterested in showing off your talent in developing deep learning algorithms on embedded hardware platforms for solving real-world problems? Join us in the second System Design Contest (SDC) at the 56th Design Automation Conference in 2019!In 2018, DAC held its inaugural system design contest. The 2018 SDC featured a low-power object detection challenge (LPODC) on designing and implementing novel algorithms based object... Read More
Research is the very heart and soul of the Design Automation Conference (DAC). In fact, one could easily argue that our industry as we know it today would not exist if not for the fundamental research that has been published at DAC for over five decades, as well as many of its sister conferences (e.g., DATE, ICCAD, etc.).This year I am honored to have been selected to serve as the 56th DAC Technical Program Committee (TPC) chair for the Research Track. And I am excited to announce that we are... Read More
Welcome to the official blog of the 56th Design Automation Conference. I’m the general chair this year, which means that it’s my job to write a blog post. There are some other duties involved, I’ve been told, but we’ll start with a blog post. You’ll hear more about and from the DAC committee members in future posts, but suffice to say for now we have assembled a great group of people from industry and academia. You can see more at this link https://dac.com/committees/executiveFifty-six is a lot... Read More
Despite what naysayers have been saying about EDA for several years, there’s a renaissance underway in electronics design. It’s profound, vibrant, exciting and unlike anything we’ve seen in decades. Just ask Dr. William Chappell, director of DARPA’s Microsystems Technology Office (MTO). William and four other DARPA officials came to the 55th Design Automation Conference in San Francisco in June to network and preview ambitious programs to energize design government-industry research and... Read More
I’ve been coming to the Design Automation Conference (DAC) for 18 years—first as an academic and, more recently, as a member of the DAC Executive Committee representing the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).And over those years, DAC has become, in my opinion, the industry’s foremost bridge between highly technical communities—ACM and IEEE in particular—that make tomorrow’s innovation happen.This is not only important to me personally, but it’s important to ACM. ACM is itself a wonderful... Read More
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DAC is the premier conference devoted to the design and automation of electronic systems (EDA), embedded systems and software (ESS), and intellectual property (IP).
