The Role of CAD Tools in VLSI Design Methodology

The effort necessary to design VLSI circuits tends to grow to unacceptable levels. A consequence is an increasing demand for CAD tools that provide more sophistication and automation. However such tools are unlikely to produce acceptable solutions in reasonable amounts of time. An alternative is to seek for architectural methods that reduce the complexity problem of VLSI design. Such methods may result in a significant change in designer productivity as well as in improved CAD tool performance.