Computationally efficient clustering of power supplies in heterogeneous real time systems

High quality power delivery for on-chip high performance integrated circuits is a significant design challenge in modern functionally diverse systems with multiple power domains. To provide a high quality power delivery system with dynamically changing voltages and transient currents, the onchip power needs to be regulated in real time, within each power domain. To exploit the advantages of existing switching and linear power supplies, a heterogeneous power delivery system has recently been proposed based on the principle of separation of power conversion and regulation, lowering the overall energy loss while requiring small on-chip area. The power efficiency of the system is shown to be a strong function of the clustering of the power supplies - the specific configuration in which power converters and regulators are co-designed. A recursive clustering algorithm with polynomial computational complexity is proposed for an optimal real time power distribution system with minimum power losses. The proposed algorithm is evaluated on IBM power grid benchmark circuits and two multi-power domain circuits, yielding up to a 21% increase in power efficiency, and orders of magnitude speedup in runtime with the proposed recursive clustering algorithm.