On Closing the Gap Between Pre-simulation and Post-simulation Results in Nanometer Analog Layouts

Abstract

In order to generate analog layout in advanced technology, it still remains lots of challenges due to the imprecise estimation of critical performance parameters. We propose an upgraded decision making framework, PEDefer, to decompose existing layout into decisive components for performance estimation. In this work, the objective is to synthesize layout solutions based on the performance estimation of user-defined constraints and existing templates. The constraints of the circuit are priorly tackled in the partition and layout enumeration stage. In addition, we attempt to have partial layout pieces as exchangeable blocks to perform pseudo-post-simulation, thus to put simulation factors in the evaluation during layout enumeration strategy. The experiments show that this flow guarantees valid analog layout results whose performances are closer to netlist-level simulation than manual designed or migrated layouts with minimal overhead.