ASML extends holistic patterning strategy with Cadence partnership

ASML is partenering with Cadence Design Systems to expand the capabilities of its holistic lithography product portfolio, further streamlining chipmakers’ process flow from design to mask production. The collaboration is supposed to bring together ASML’s computational lithography solutions and the Cadence physical design back-end tools, leading to enhanced Design Technology Co-Optimization (DTCO) capabilities for advanced nodes, and other technologies.

No information was given on the amount of money involved in the deal.

“In the face of shrinking process nodes, engineers are increasingly relying on designer-friendly, production-accurate manufacturability checks throughout the design phase to realize tighter imaging performance and cycle time goals,” said Dr. Anirudh Devgan, senior vice president and general manager of the Digital & Signoff Group and the System & Verification Groupat Cadence. “Together with ASML, we are now able to efficiently bridge the gap between design and manufacturing, empowering our customers to take better control of their design intent, reliability and yield through improved lithography awareness capabilities.”

As part of its holistic lithography approach, ASML has developed lithography and patterning models that can simulate how a chip design is realized in silicon, representing the actual manufacturing processes. The integration of these design models into Cadence products enables DTCO to deliver optimal design scaling while securing manufacturability and yield.

As the first result of their collaboration, the newly released Cadence® LPA PLUS enables engineers to simulate the manufacturability of their design at any time during implementation and signoff, enabling more efficient delivery of high-quality designs.

ASML’s partnership with Cadence represents another major step toward realizing a full end-to-end design-to-mask process flow. When combined with an earlier partnership with NCS, engineers can now leverage litho-aware design and mask data preparation on a seamlessly integrated platform.

“Since ASML’s early days, we’ve developed our systems in a cooperative network of partners, a practice we call Open Innovation,” said Christophe Fouquet, Executive Vice President of Applications at ASML. “This enables us to remain focused on developing our core holistic lithography technology leadership in modeling, scanner imaging and patterning process control, while leveraging our partnerships to deliver improved cycle time and productivity along the whole value chain from design technology development to production implementation of the physical design, mask design, and mask data preparation.”

Source: press release ASML