Sanyo Achieves Production Design Success for Digital Consumer Product

    Business Editors/High-Tech Editors

    YOKOHAMA, Japan & SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 26, 2005--

    Cadence Synthesis Reduces Production Cost with Improved
    Speed, Area and Power on Critical Design

    Cadence Design Systems, Inc. (NYSE:CDN)(Nasdaq:CDN) today announced that Sanyo has achieved an important production tapeout with the Cadence(R) Encounter(TM) digital IC design platform, including RTL Compiler synthesis. Encounter RTL Compiler helped decrease power consumption of an important block of Sanyo's chip by 10 percent, while maintaining critical performance requirements. RTL Compiler shrunk the chip's area significantly over the size achieved by competitive solutions.
    Sanyo applied Encounter RTL Compiler to a design-critical block for high-end graphics processing. This was integrated into an ASIC chip at the heart of Sanyo's new digital consumer product.
    "We chose Encounter RTL Compiler to tape out this important new chip because it provided us with better area and power that couldn't be attained using our previous synthesis solution," said Dr. Hideki Yamauchi, Materials and Devices Development Center BU, Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd. "Besides the improvements we realized in speed, area and power, we appreciated the ease with which we were able to integrate Encounter RTL Compiler into our existing production environment."
    Interconnect related parameters, design rules and failure mechanisms dominate nanometer designs. Physical properties of designs at and below 130 nanometers require a metric for speed, area, power and test. Quality of Silicon (QoS) is a metric that measures a design's physical characteristics -- in terms of performance, area and power -- with wires. Encounter RTL Compiler synthesis uses a unique set of global-focus synthesis technologies that offer chip designers the highest QoS in less time, and with less effort.
    "We are very excited about the unique technology that Encounter RTL Compiler has helped further the success of this important Japanese customer," said Dr. Chi-Ping Hsu, corporate vice president at Cadence. "Encounter RTL Compiler is now being successfully used in production by systems companies throughout the world to create better quality of designs within a few weeks of product installation."

    About Cadence

    Cadence is the world's largest supplier of electronic design technologies and engineering services. Cadence products and services are used to accelerate and manage the design of semiconductors, computer systems, networking equipment, telecommunications equipment, consumer electronics, and other electronics based products. With approximately 4,850 employees and 2003 revenues of approximately $1.1 billion, Cadence has sales offices, design centers, and research facilities around the world. The company is headquartered in San Jose, Calif., and trades on both the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq under the symbol CDN. More information is available at www.cadence.com.

    Cadence and the Cadence logo are registered trademarks, and Encounter is a trademark of Cadence Design Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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CONTACT: Cadence Design Systems, Inc. Judy Erkanat, 408-894-2302 jerkanat@cadence.com

KEYWORD: CALIFORNIA JAPAN INTERNATIONAL ASIA PACIFIC INDUSTRY KEYWORD: HARDWARE COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS TELECOMMUNICATIONS SOFTWARE NETWORKING PRODUCT SOURCE: Cadence Design Systems, Inc.

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