HP and Cadence Advance Alliance to Bring Electronic Design Automation on Linux

Business Wire, June 11, 2002

Business Editors/High Tech Writers

Design Automation Conference 2002

NEW ORLEANS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 11, 2002

HP (NYSE:HPQ) today announced the advancement of an alliance with Cadence Design Systems to broaden the reach of Electronic Design Automation (EDA) using Linux. As part of this, Cadence has furthered its investment in HP IA-32 and Intel(R) Itanium(R)-based servers and workstations running Linux for deployment in its development, testing and customer support programs.

HP and Cadence's efforts are part of a strategy to provide powerful yet economical solutions for customers using the combination of an open-sourced operating system, industry standard 32- and 64-bit systems and market-leading EDA applications.

"Cadence made the decision to extend its current Linux offerings to all integrated circuit solutions based on the reliability and robust platform solutions available from HP running Red Hat Linux," said Lavi Lev, executive vice president, Cadence IC Solutions Business Unit. "We feel that the platform solutions available now will meet the stringent requirements for reliability and total cost of ownership our customers demand."

The first applications from Cadence to exploit Linux on Itanium-based platforms will be its family of Physical Verification solutions, which are used in the manufacturing of integrated circuit design. Cadence is the largest supplier of electronic design automation products, methodology services and design services and its solutions are used to accelerate and manage the design of semiconductors, computer systems, networking and telecommunications equipment, consumer electronics, and a variety of other electronics-based products.

Verification of System on a Chip (SoC) integration is extremely complex, demanding solutions that can verify billions of interactions. Using Linux as a backdrop, Cadence's Physical Verification solutions can readily exploit the multi-processor, performance and large memory space available to these systems. Over the course of the next year, Cadence will expand its support for Linux to the Itanium processor family as it ports EDA applications to these powerful platforms.

"HP is a historic leader in the EDA market, holding the top position for EDA systems in the technical systems and servers markets, and the second slot in the overall workstation market," said Chris Willard, vice president, Workstations and High-Performance Systems program, IDC. "IDC believes that HP's success in technical markets is due in large part to its ability to field complete, well-integrated solutions and to adapt these solutions to changing customer requirements and environments.

"We see HP's agreement with Cadence as indicative of the company's continued success in partnering with key ISVs in technical markets. At the same time, HP's support of Linux and Intel-based solutions demonstrates the company's ability to incorporate new technologies into its overall product offering."

"Since we began our formal relationship with Cadence in July 2000, together we have broken new ground in EDA, emerging from our work in the labs and through the success of our joint customers," said Martin Fink, general manager, HP Linux Systems Division. "As the No. 1 provider of Linux systems in the world, HP sees the EDA market as a key area that will benefit from the adoption of Linux on x86 and Itanium-based platforms. Cadence was early to recognize opportunities stemming from this shift and we look forward to future milestones we will achieve as part of the expanded relationship."

EDA allows design engineers to transcend the power and miniaturization limits of integrated circuits used for electronic devices. EDA applications allow engineers to develop and design IC features that are a fraction of the size of a piece of human hair and transform them into a silicon chip. Cadence's shift to EDA applications on Itanium-based HP workstations and servers running Linux brings IC development to new heights -- transforming the power, functionality and size of electronic devices, from digital cameras to supercomputers.

The Intel Itanium processor family architecture was co-developed by HP with Intel to provide leading performance and unparalleled flexibility for pervasive, standards-based, high-end enterprise computing. Introduced last year, the Itanium processor family is renowned for its ability to handle large volumes of data and complete complex calculations, such as those used in EDA-based applications on Linux, Windows(R) and HP-UX.

More information about HP's Linux initiatives can be found at http://www.hp.com/linux or 1 888 HP LINUX.

About HP

HP is a leading global provider of products, technologies, solutions and services to consumers and businesses. The company's offerings span IT infrastructure, personal computing and access devices, global services and imaging and printing. HP merged with Compaq Computer Corp. on May 3, 2002. The merged company had combined revenue of approximately $81.7 billion in fiscal 2001 and operations in more than 160 countries. More information about HP is available at http://www.hp.com.