The Phil Kaufman Award honors an individual who has had a demonstrable IMPACT on the field of electronic design through contributions in Electronic Design Automation (EDA). The award was established as a tribute to Phil Kaufman, the late industry pioneer who turned innovative technologies into commercial businesses that have benefited electronic designers. Additional information can be found on the ESD-Alliance website.
Note: Phil Kaufman awardees will automatically be included in the Phil Kaufman Hall of Fame, which additionally honors well-deserving individuals who have made significant contributions to the ESD field but who passed away before their contributions have been recognized with the Phil Kaufman Award. Such nominations must be done on a dedicated form.
Award/Recognition Menu
Annual award dinner honoring awardee. The recipient’s name will be listed on a permanent large award and a smaller individual award will be presented to the recipient. Hotel and airline expenses of the recipient and spouse/partner will be included.
ESDA and CEDA will split the cost of the award and travel expenses of the recipient.
An award dinner will be held in the Silicon Valley.
Phil Kaufman received his BSEE (1964) and MSEE (1966) from the University of Michigan. After many years as a design engineer at Interstate Electronics and Computer Automation, Phil joined Intel's microprocessor component group in 1976, where he became a design manager.
The complexity of microprocessor chips was increasing rapidly, with corresponding increases in design time. In 1982, he joined Silicon Compiler Systems as chairman and CEO. SCS was an early provider of high-level EDA tools to speed the design of complex ICs. The tools were adopted by a number of system and IC design companies.
As the complexity of ICs increased, so did the issue of verifying the designs. In 1988, Phil joined Quickturn Design Systems, where he became CEO. An early provider of emulation systems used to speed the verification of complex chips, Quickturn's systems enabled engineers to find and fix bugs much faster, thus speeding the development of complex chips. His former employer, Intel, was among the many companies using Quickturn's systems.
Phil's interest in electronics began with his childhood interest in electric trains, followed by amateur radio, then personal computers.
Phil died of a heart attack during a business trip in Japan on 17 July 1992. The EDA Consortium founded the Phil Kaufman Award in 1994 to honor his memory and contributions to the electronic design industry.
The Phil Kaufman Award honors an individual who has had a demonstrable IMPACT on the field of electronic design through contributions in Electronic Design Automation (EDA). The contributions should fall into any or a combination of the following categories:
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Business Impact
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Industry Direction and Promotion Impact
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Technology and Engineering Impact (Analog & RF, Architecture / Structures / FPGA, Embedded Systems, Formal Verification, Design, DFM, IP, Layout, Simulation, Synthesis, Test, Overall, etc.)
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Educational and Mentoring Impact
The nominee’s contributions are judged by their beneficial impact on working electronic designers and engineers.
The award is open to any individual who has made a demonstrable beneficial impact on working electronic designers and engineers.
Please complete and email the nomination form to (Click to show email).
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Length of nomination form should not exceed 8 pages
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Attach at least three, and not more than five additional endorsement pages. (No more than 1 page per endorsement)
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Nominations are active for 3 years. Nominations may be updated and re-submitted for renewed consideration.
If you have questions about the nomination process, email (Click to show email) or call the ESD Alliance at +1 408.943.6900.
2025
For leadership in and business impact on Electronic Design Automation Industry
2024
For sustained fundamental contributions to Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) design automation technology, from circuit to system levels, with widespread industrial impact.
2023
For his pioneering contributions that have enabled the industry to address the challenges of interconnect delay dominated designs, including: Interconnect Modeling, Physical Synthesis, Lithography Directed Design & Manufacturability, Co-design and Co-optimization of Logic and Layout, and Power Grid Simulation and Optimization.
2022
For his significant impact on the electronic system design industry through pioneering technical contributions
2021
Dr. Devgan is honored for his extensive electronic design automation (EDA) contributions. He is recognized as a leading authority in parallel and distributed computing as well as Circuit Simulation, Physical Design and Signoff, System Design and Analysis, Statistical Design and Optimization, Verification and Hardware Platforms, and more.
2019
For her extensive contributions to EDA through technical efforts, community service, and leadership
FIRST FEMALE RECIPIENT OF THIS AWARD
2018
For his overall impact on the electronics industry through contributions to scan Design for Testability and related test automation.
2017
For his contributions to analog design automation and impact on EDA education
2016
For his Pioneering and Sustained Contributions to Design for Manufacturing
2015
For his Leadership Role in Growing the EDA and IC Design Industries
2014
For providing innovative EDA and IP companies with exceptional vision, mentoring, and financial support
2013
For major contributions to transistor modeling enabling the generation of FinFET based design
2011
For his work in leading the transformation from ad hoc EDA to algorithmic EDA
2010
For his efforts in formalizing the EDA industry and as founder of the Design Automation Conference (DAC)
2009
For his seminal technological breakthroughs in the area of formal verification.
2008
For his technical and business impact on the EDA industry
2007
For numerous accomplishments and technical contributions
2006
For his numerous and significant contributions to the EDA industry in the area of computer simulation of integrated circuit (IC) technology.
2005
For his efforts in the development of the Verilog language and its associated family of simulators.
2004
For his business contributions that helped grow the EDA industry.
2003
For his support and contributions to the EDA industry, including the pioneering work that is behind the success of many of today’s commercial Electronic Design Automation (EDA) products.
2002
For his distinguished contributions to the EDA industry
2001
For his contributions to circuit simulation, computer aided design of integrated circuits, logic synthesis, and system design.
2000
For distinguished contribution to electronic design automation.
1999
For his contributions in creating and driving technology advances that have had measurable impact on the productivity of electronic design engineers.
1998
For his outstanding contributions to circuit layout theory and algorithms in partitioning, floorplanning, placement and routing.
1997
For his numerous accomplishments, including laying the ground rules for making commercial EDA a reality and introducing the first software only business model.
1996
For his structured design approach to VLSI design, defining a new methodology for chip development which was the primary reason behind design productivity increasing so rapidly throughout the 1980s.
1995
For his work in circuit simulation, including the SPICE circuit simulator, and as a significant industry catalyst for EDA for integrated circuits.
1994
For his many fundamental contributions to central areas in EDA, including the integral charge control model for bipolar junction transistors that bears his name, the Gummel-Poon model.