Accelerating Concurrent Hardware Design with Behavioural Modelling and System Simulation

This paper describes a functional hardware verification methodology for ASIC intensive products. It spans the ASIC, board, and system level, enabling simulation of the design concurrent with ASIC and board development. The simulation strategy relies on rapid development of behavioural models of ASICs to enable work to proceed in parallel and to achieve the necessary simulation efficiency. The results from a project on which the methodology was used are presented. The process provided early visibility of over 200 issues in the system of which 32 were critical to the successful conformance and timely completion of the project.