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SUNNYVALE, California, July 27, 2026 -- True Circuits, Inc. (TCI),
a leading provider of analog and mixed-signal intellectual property (IP) and
developer of computer aided design (CAD) software announced today its intention
to donate the JSPICE Design Environment (JDE) to form the foundation of a
modern AMS development environment that unifies design generation, simulation,
measurement, characterization, data analysis, and AI-assisted engineering into
a single extensible environment. JDE defines an open, common set of design,
measurement and analysis languages and a common data model for waveform data
coming from a simulator. This all enables process-independent designs and
simulator-decoupled measurement and analysis scripts that are highly reusable.
Following on announcements of JDE availability through a beta program over
the last two years, TCI sees the immense value of putting JDE in the hands of
the open source analog design community so users, content creators and service
providers can freely use and contribute to this powerful design environment.
The goal is to create a vibrant JDE ecosystem where work and ideas can be shared,
problems solved and innovation unleashed to dramatically improve design quality
and reduce design time. Over the coming months, further announcements will be
made about ecosystem access and JDE software availability.
The Case for JDE™
Digital design has become highly driven by software standards and abstraction.
It has achieved impressive productivity gains and is poised to benefit from the
use of AI. Analog and mixed-signal (AMS) design has not. Much of AMS design
remains tied to schematics, fragile scripts, manual analysis, and knowledge that
exists primarily in the heads of a few experienced engineers. With JDE, analog
designers can be at least 10X more productive. Adding AI and building a community
may increase that to 100X or more.
JDE replaces a company or designer-specific flow that is saddled with multiple
data formats and ad hoc scripts with open engineering languages, APIs and shared
data models that are easy to use and reuse. Much like digital verification, JDE
has several layers of abstraction for measurement and analysis, and complete
characterization frameworks.
JDE enables users to run massively parallel, mixed mode simulations, either
locally or in the cloud, or both with unlimited simulator licenses. JDE supports
SPICE, Verilog and Verilog-A. It does directed logic synthesis and includes
sophisticated Statistical Timing Analysis (STA) that uses SPICE data for each
subcircuit. A preprocessor compiles an expressive netlist generation language
supporting process node parameterization, conditional generation, reusable
libraries and programmable circuit generation. JDE is designed to support
multiple commercial and open-source simulators through common interfaces..
Legacy and Giving Back
Analog design automation has been the backbone and hallmark of True Circuits
since its founding in 1998. This was a passion of its principal author, Dr.
John G. Maneatis, who dedicated his illustrious career in the semiconductor
industry to the idea that analog design should be as predictable and verifiable
as digital design. He believed from the beginning, that what could be automated,
should be automated, that doing the same thing over and over was a waste of a
talented engineer’s time. John understood that once engineering knowledge is
expressed algorithmically, it can be shared, reused, improved, verified and
eventually understood by AI. While John is best known for his definitive work
in PLL design, his gift was this design philosophy that turned TCI’s innovative
circuit designs into some of the most standardized, full-featured and widely
used IP in the semiconductor industry.
“Opening JDE to the semiconductor community is our way of sharing John’s
gift with the fellow engineers he so loved collaborating with and supporting
over the years, said Stephen G. Maneatis, True Circuits’ Chief Executive Officer.
“Knowing other designers can freely explore, automate and innovate is a lasting
legacy to John and his life-long effort to keep analog design alive and inspire
the next generation of dreamers and doers.”
"The growing complexity of today's SoCs and FPGAs presents chip designers with
ever increasing challenges that often result in compromises on features,
performance and flexibility", remarked Brian Gardner, True Circuits' V.P. of
Business Development. "Our goal is to help chip designers tackle these challenges
with a single digital PLL that offers broad functionality and performance in an
easy to use programmable design. The improvements we have made to the already
world-class Ultra PLL show our commitment to technological innovation. Whether
the need is ultra-low jitter for a SerDes, precise frequency resolution for HDMI
or extremely low phase noise for an ADC, our new Ultra+ PLL has them covered."
About the JDE™ Ecosystem
The JDE open ecosystem allows engineering knowledge, not just software, to be
shared. Characterization packages, measurement libraries, generators, verification
suites, and AI agents can all build on common languages and shared data models.
It will be easily accessible by a variety of users, from universities and businesses
to individual designers, all providing content and services to make JDE the development
environment of the future. The future of semiconductors lies with universities that
attract and train engineering talent, and JDE is positioned to be their design
environment of choice.
For more information about JDE, visit
www.truecircuits.com/jspice.html.
For discussion about JDE and how to get started, contact Brian Gardner, V.P. of Business
Development, True Circuits, Inc., bgardner@truecircuits.com.
About True Circuits
True Circuits develops and markets a broad range of industry leading PLLs, DLLs
and DDR PHY hard macros for ICs for the semiconductor, systems and electronics
industries. TCI's robust state-of-the-art circuits, methodical and proven design
strategy, and close association with the world's leading foundries, IDMs, and design
services companies allow the company to quickly and reliably create new and innovative
designs in a variety of advanced process technologies. Over the last 28 years, True
Circuits has distinguished itself as a technology leader in the timing IP space,
and its PLLs and DLLs are used extensively around the world in its customers'
products with production volumes well into the billions.
True Circuits is headquartered at 333 W. El Camino Real, Suite 220, Sunnyvale,
California 94087 and can be found on the web at
www.truecircuits.com. Product inquiries can be made by calling the company directly at (650) 949-3400 or via e-mail at sales@truecircuits.com
True Circuits PLLs and DLLs are available for immediate customer delivery in
TSMC, GLOBALFOUNDRIES and UMC processes from 180nm to 3nm. For more information
about True Circuits IP products, visit www.truecircuits.com/tci_technology.html
and www.truecircuits.com/product_matrix.html.
Press Contact: Kimberly Toan, True Circuits, Inc., (650) 949-3400, Ext. 3404,
kim@truecircuits.com.
Acronyms and definitions
ASIC Application Specific IC
DLL Delay-Locked Loop
DDR Double Data Rate
FPGA Field Programmable Gate Array
IC Integrated Circuit
IP Intellectual Property
PLL Phase-Locked Loop
The JDE logo is a trademark of True Circuits, Inc.
The True Circuits logo is a trademark of True Circuits, Inc.
All other trademarks and tradenames are the property of their respective owners.
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