Selectively patterned masks: Beyond structured ASIC

Abstract

Conventional structured ASIC still suffers from large delay and area due to the use of homogeneous array of tiles. We propose a new lithography method called selectively patterned masks (SPM), which enables more than one type of tiles to be used in structured ASIC. This structured ASIC using mixture of different tiles relaxes regularity. To assess SPM concept, A new structured ASIC is proposed; tile and routing architecture, and routing algorithm are all addressed. Experiment results using 45-nm technology show that proposed concept can push the limit of structured ASIC closer to traditional ASIC.