Moonsu Kim, Eun yeung Yu, Eunbyeol Kim Ayhan Mutlu

Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Synopsys Co., Ltd.

System LSI Division
• Process & Design trends
• Random variation is increasing in advanced process nodes
• Design size and performance gap are also increasing, but TAT limit is almost constant

• Requirement for process variation aware STA

• Advanced node requires higher level of STA accuracy for better PPA within tight TAT limit
• Accurate process variation will remove unnecessary pessimism and optimism at the same time
• Traditional AOCV(Advanced On Chip Variation) and constraint variation modeling has limitations
resulting in inherent pessimism
• Need to use POCV (Parametric OCV) to resolve traditional method’s limitation using advanced
modeling for delay/slew/constraint variation
• Challenge 1: slew/load impact to delay variation
• In Advanced OCV (AOCV), delay variation is function of logic depth and
distance, but does not consider slew/load impact

• In actual design, the magnitude of process variation will increase at higher

slew/load indices on advanced nodes

AOCV Variation is
independent to slew/load
AOCV Variation is
dependent on stage count

OCV_sigma (AOCV)
• Solution: Liberty Variation Format (LVF) for slew/load-based variation
• LVF includes delay variation based on actual slew/load
• The cell delay variation is modeled as a function of input transition and output
load per timing arc
POCV LVF delay variation σ = f (slew,load)

X1 X2 X3

Propagated path
X1+ X2+X3 arrival time distribution

EXAMPLE of LVF delay variation

ocv_sigma_cell_rise ("delay_template_4x4") {
sigma_type : "late";
index_1("0.001, 0.005, 0.010, 1.00");
index_2("0.001, 0.002, 0.003, 0.10");
values( "σ11, σ12, σ13, σ14", \
"σ21, σ22, σ23, σ24", \
Slew

"σ31, σ32, σ33, σ34", \

"σ41, σ42, σ43, σ44", );
} Load
• Samsung experiment results
• Extracted 300 paths from real design to compare arrival times using
PrimeTime POCV with MonteCarlo (MC) reference

• POCV has good correlation with MC using slew/load dependent model

• AOCV has large pessimism for some cases and therefore larger error spread
than POCV

POCV AOCV
error error
average -0.16% -0.85%

stdev 1.02% 7.45%

AOCV(green) : lumped slew/load model

POCV(red) : slew/load aware variation model
Monte Carlo(blue): reference
• Challenge 2: Common point optimism reduction for Min Pulse
Width(MPW) and half-cycle path
• Different transition at common point  need to keep process variation at
common point
• In AOCV, process variation can’t be exactly calculated by statistical sum of
rising and falling paths and it can’t be separated with other variation models
 Process variation will be removed from slack computation

cell1 cell2 A B C
A
B C ------------------------------
Launch clock : F  R  F
Capture clock: R  F  R

AOCV-based variation at point C Actual process variation at Point C

v.s. = sqrt( σ
cell1,rise +σcell2,fall +σcell1,fall +σcell2,rise
= max_derate – min_derate (CRPR) ^2 ^2 ^2 ^2 )

= 0 (max_derate = min_derate)
AOCV-based variation can be optimistic as
it may be removed by CRPR
• Solution: Accurate process variation for MPW using POCV
• Using POCV, accurate process variation for MPW and half cycle’s slack
computation will remove optimism

• Samsung experiment results

• For extracted 10K paths from real design, average 3.3% optimism reduction
can be reflected into MPW slack (or half cycle path) computation by POCV
model

cell1 cell2 POCV process variation at Point C (same as actual)

B C = sqrt( σcell1,rise^2+σcell2,fall^2+σcell1,fall^2+σcell2,rise^2 )
A
A B C
------------------------------ avg stdev
Launch clock : F  R  F
Capture clock: R  F  R MPW Delta -3.32% 0.79%

< MPW Delta: Optimism Reduction>

Delta = (new_pw – old_pw) / old_pw
new_pw: pulse width considering process variation at common point using POCV
old_pw: pulse width not considering process variation (traditional)
• Challenge 3: Delay variation is highly correlated with output slew
variation
• Output slew variation will affect delay variation in next stage
• Output slew variation has an increased impact at lower voltage

MonteCarlo Simulation for

Inverter Cell
? Dσcell2
Highly correlated
Dσcell1 ? Sσcell2 X axis: cell delay
Sσcell1 Y axis: output slew
Highly correlated
Sin,cell2
cell1
^^^^ ρ = 0.78
cell2

Dσcell1: cell1’s delay variation

Sσcell1 : cell1’s output slew variation
S in,cell1 : cell2’s input slew
• Solution: POCV considers correlation between slew and delay variation
• Better accuracy for lower voltages by reflecting correlation between slew and
delay variation in STA

• Samsung experiment results

• About 1% accuracy improvement by correlated slew variation modeling for
150 extracted paths
<POCV> Correlated delay and slew variation
Dσcell2
Dσcell1 Dσcell2(Sσcell1) Dσcell1: cell1’s delay variation w/o input slew variation
Sσcell1 Sσcell2 Sσcell1 : cell1’s output slew variation
Sσcell2 (Sσcell1) Dσcell2 : cell2’s delay variation w/o input slew variation
Dσcell2(Sσcell1) : cell2’s delay variation induced by input slew variation
Sσcell2 : cell2’s output slew variation w/o input slew variation
^^^^ Sσcell2 (Sσcell1) : cell2’s output slew variation induced by input slew variation
cell1 cell2

Delay variation only Delay variation + slew Delay variation + slew

variation (no correlation) variation (correlated)

Error(%) Mean =1.55% Mean =0.84% Mean = 0.56%

= (STA –MC)/MC Stdev = 0.70% Stdev = 0.56% Stdev = 0.55%
• Challenge 4: Traditionally, Flop’s constraint variation is added to nominal
constraint value as margin
 Delay variation and constraint variation in STA becomes linear sum

• However, delay variation and constraint variation is independent and not

correlated
 Delay variation and constraint variation should be statistical sum

• By separating constraint variation with nominal constraint value 

theoretically maximum 40% pessimism reduction

A) Traditional linear sum: total variation = σpath + σH

σL B) POCV Statistical sum: total variation = SQRT ( σpath^2 + σH^2)
σH where σpath = SQRT ( σL^2 + σC^2)

Max difference between linear and statistical sum is when σpath= σH

 Max { (A–B) / B } = (2 - 1.414) / 1.414 = ~40%
 This is the pessimism from linear sum method
σC
 By adopting separate constraint variation model, maximum 40%
pessimism of slack variation can be reduced
• Solution: POCV Support of Constraint Variation
• Uses statistical sum of delay and constraint variation
• Theoretical maximum of 40% pessimism reduction than traditional method

• Samsung experiment results

• Extracted 1000 paths from real design to evaluate real world pessimism
reduction when using separate modeling of FF constraint variation
• Linear sum pessimism = (linear sum slack – statistical sum slack)/linear sum
slack

Max ~40% pessimism reduction

• Majority of paths achieve close to 40%
avg stdev
pessimism reduction in total variation Linearsum
-0.37 0.04
Pessimism

• Average 37% pessimism reduction of

1000 paths
• Review potentially opportunities to improve accuracy challenges caused
by limitation of traditional variation (AOCV) and review solutions using
advanced method of PrimeTime POCV
• Slew/load aware delay variation modeling
- Accuracy improvement  more opportunity of both robust and optimized design based on PBA
accuracy enhancement
• Common point optimism removal for Half-cycle and Min Pulse Width
- Average 3.3% optimism reduction  robust design for MPW and half cycle path
• Correlated slew variation impact on accuracy
- Average 1% mean accuracy improvement by correlated modeling of delay and slew variation
• Statistical constraint variation modeling
- Average 37% pessimism reduction compared to traditional linear sum of delay variation and
constraint variation

• POCV based accurate analysis is necessary to meet tight PPA

requirement with limited resources for advanced nodes

• Results shown in this presentation based on Samsung Advanced node

design using Synopsys PrimeTime POCV Analysis