Author: Olzhas S. Tazabekov (LinkedIn)

Prerequisites: basic programming skills with Python and SPICE

Intro: Why is All the Buzz

Throughout our University degree programs, we all learned how to analyze, design and verify electrical circuits. Unfortunately or fortunately, most of us were trained using industry level graded software (e.g. Cadence, Synopsys, etc.). However, in real life (outside of school) that software does come with a pretty heavy price associated with the cost of licenses and IT infrastructure. So, unless you are heavy weight semiconductor giant with millions in corporate accounts it is a quite a challenge to afford. Where does this leave all those half starving tech startups or ordinary people? Open source software has been one of the answers so far (another one is to sell a kidney of one of the board members and purchase an IC design tool license 😉 ). Continue reading →