by Ed Sperling
Prior to the Synopsys acquisition of Virage Logic, Synopsys seemed to have an almost exclusive relationship with ARM. Since then, Cadence and Mentor Graphics have both been cutting deals with ARM for support of its IP cores.

What’s changed? With regard to the Virage Logic acquisition, very little. Synopsys did acquire the ARC processor through that deal, but ARC had been much more focused on high-end audio and supplying all the necessary codecs that it decidedly was not a threat to ARM. And Synopsys and ARM continue to work closely together on a variety of fronts, both in ARM’s support of Synopsys’ standard IP for things like USB and Synopsys’ support of ARM’s processor IP.

But there has been far more activity between ARM and Synopsys’ top competitors of late. In September, Cadence rolled out an optimized implementation methodology for ARM’s new Cortex-A15 processor. The two companies also created an ARM-Cadence Encounter reference methodology. And this week, Mentor inked a deal for test and repair of ARM’s memories and processor cores.

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