DAC 2024 Distinguished Speaker: Andrew B. Kahng

Each year, CEDA invites experts in EDA to present at the Design Automation Conference (DAC). The IEEE CEDA Distinguished Speaker Luncheon will be presented by Andrew B. Kahng, Distinguished Professor of CSE and ECE at the University of California, San Diego.

Date: Tuesday, 25 June 2024
Time: 12:00 PM PT
Location:  DAC 2024 in San Francisco, CA, USA

Presenter: Andrew B. Kahng, Distinguished Professor of CSE and ECE at the University of California, San Diego.

Talk Title: AI for EDA and Disruptive Innovation

Abstract: Recent years have brought a flood of proposed applications for AI and machine learning in EDA. The potential benefits of AI for EDA, including improved design quality with reduced cost and schedule, have attracted significant efforts and focus across both academia and industry. But we have not seen truly disruptive innovation in this space – yet. This talk will examine what disruptive innovations at the AI-EDA nexus might look like. First, what are root causes for the absence of visible disruptions from AI-EDA innovations? These include technical and ecosystem challenges, the time and patience needed to reach tipping points, and the presence of active blockers to innovation. Second, where might advances in AI for EDA bring truly transformative, disruptive innovations to benefit the semiconductor ecosystem? Here, possibilities span analysis and simulation tooling, the nature of design signoff, the EDA-designer-foundry dynamic, and more. There are also basic categories of disruptive innovations: for the EDA business model; for the worldwide ecosystem of academic researchers, EDA vendors, and designers; and for EDA technology itself. Third, and finally, what will accelerate inevitable disruptive innovations, who might deliver them, and how?

Speaker Bio: Andrew B. Kahng is Distinguished Professor of CSE and ECE and holder of the endowed chair in high-performance computing at UC San Diego. He was visiting scientist at Cadence (1995-97) and founder/CTO at Blaze DFM (2004-06). He is coauthor of 3 books and over 500 journal and conference papers, holds 35 issued U.S. patents, and is a fellow of ACM and IEEE. He was the 2019 Ho-Am Prize laureate in Engineering. He has served as general chair of IEEE CEDA-sponsored conferences such as DAC, ISPD, SLIP and MLCAD, and from 2000-2016 served as international chair/co-chair of the International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) Design and System Drivers working groups. He was the principal investigator of the U.S. DARPA “OpenROAD” project (https://theopenroadproject.org/) from June 2018 to December 2023, and until August 2023 served as principal investigator and director of “TILOS” (https://tilos.ai/), a U.S. NSF AI Research Institute.