Strategic Considerations for Emerging SOC FPGAs

Company: Altera Corp.

Semiconductor devices that integrate FPGA fabric, hardened CPU subsystems, and other hardened IP — SOC FPGAs — have reached a tipping point that will lead to their broad proliferation in the next decade, therefore offering many options for system designers. These SOC FPGAs complement the decade-long availability of soft-core CPUs and other soft IP for building systems on FPGAs. A mix of technical, business, and market forces underpin this tipping point, and vendors such as Altera, Cypress Semiconductor, Intel, and Xilinx have announced or shipped SOC FPGA devices.

The primary drivers of this tipping point are:

The move to parallel and multicore processing for power efficiency. The shift of FPGAs to the leading edge of new semiconductor process technology. Increasing use of FPGAs in embedded systems. The economic realities of Moore’s law. The consolidation of CPU architectures.

As the SOC FPGA era emerges, systems designers must consider the following key strategic questions when choosing these devices:

Which devices will experience a "platform effect," that leads to a self-reinforcing cycle of vendor, ecosystem, and customer development? Which devices will support IP reuse across the broadest array of options? Which FPGA technology allows for the maximum cost and performance effectiveness?

Reprinted from SOCcentral.com, your first stop for ASIC, FPGA, EDA, and IP news and design information.
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