About OpenROAD
Foundations and Realization of Open, Accessible Design
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OpenROAD
The Problem


Our Goal
- 24-hour, No-Human-In-The-Loop layout design for SOC, Package and PCB with no Power-Performance-Area (PPA) loss
- Tapeout-capable tools in source code form, with permissive licensing → seed future “Linux of EDA”
Our Approach

- No Humans: tools must adapt and self-tune, must never get stuck unexpectedly
- 24 hours: extreme partitioning of problems
- parallel search on cloud
- machine learning for predictability
- Mantra: Correctness and safety by construction
- Mantra: Embrace freedom from choice
- Mantra: Often, only one thread needs to succeed
Impact
- Create new “Base Technologies” that enable 24-hour, autonomous design
- Extreme partitioning (bite-sized problems)
- Parallel search and optimization
- Machine learning: models of tools, designs
- New paradigm for design tools and methods: autonomy first
- Bring down barriers to democratize HW design
- Embedded vision chips (28nm/16nm) from Michigan Internal Design Advisors team
- Layout @Michigan: 10+ weeks, significant resource
- OpenROAD and IDEA goal: 1 day, no humans (!)


Team
