UltraSoc acquired by Siemens

Siemens says that the addition of UltraSoC enables a unified data-driven infrastructure that can enhance product quality, safety and cybersecurity, and the creation of a comprehensive solution to help semiconductor industry customers overcome key pain points including manufacturing defects, software and hardware bugs, device early-failure and wear-out, functional safety, and malicious attacks.

“Siemens’ acquisition of UltraSoC means that for the first time our customers can access not just design-for-test, but a comprehensive ‘Design for Lifecycle Management’ solution for system-on-chips, including functional safety, security and optimisation,” says Brady Benware, Tessent Vice President and General Manager, Siemens Digital Industries Software. “By utilising design augmentation to detect, mitigate and eliminate risks throughout the SoC lifecycle, customers can radically improve time-to-revenue, product quality & safety, and profitability. UltraSoC has a fast-growing business and impressive customer list and, as part of Siemens, can complement Tessent to create a truly unique offering in the market.”

UltraSoC has pioneered embedding monitoring hardware into complex SoCs to enable “fab-to-field” analytics capabilities designed to accelerate silicon bring-up, optimise product performance, and confirm that devices are operating “as designed” for functional safety and cybersecurity purposes.

Tessent supplies SoC design-for-test (DFT) solutions, and has established strengths in the field of automotive functional safety via its Tessent Safety Ecosystem.

Siemens says that the deal can benefit the entire semiconductor product lifecycle, including structural, electrical, and functional capabilities of SoCs. It also supports Siemens’ comprehensive digital twin with UltraSoC providing monitoring of the real device.

“This acquisition accelerates UltraSoC's vision at a much larger scale with the incredible team, assets, industry know-how and footprint of Siemens,” said Rupert Baines, CEO, UltraSoC (pictured). “Being part of one of the world’s foremost technology companies will allow UltraSoC to better serve our customers by accelerating R&D, leveraging a much larger pool of go-to-market resources, and an enormous global infrastructure. It has been clear since our initial meeting that UltraSoC and Siemens share a vision on how technology businesses can transform their operations end-to- end, from design conception to field deployment and we are excited to join the community.”

UltraSoC‘s products are widely used in the automotive, high-performance computing, storage and semiconductor industries.

The company was recently selected as a participant in the DARPA AISS (Automatic Implementation of Secure Silicon) program; and is a member of the Secure-CAV consortium, an ambitious collaborative project that aims to improve the safety and security of tomorrow’s connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs). Siemens’ acquisition of UltraSoC is due to close in the fourth quarter of Siemens’ fiscal year 2020. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Added Rupert Baines, “After five years in the role of CEO at UltraSoC, I am proud that we have agreed to become a part of Siemens, in a move that we knew made perfect sense from the time of our first meetings. It is striking just how clearly aligned our visions are."

"The pieces of the jigsaw fit together so nicely", Baines conitnued. "UltraSoC’s technology and history with its customers; where Tessent is coming from and its market-leading design-for-test offering; and the broader vision of Siemens Digital Industries. The combination takes us to another level: product lifecycle management is such a significant big-picture opportunity, as is cybersecurity and the concept of the Digital Twin. Tessent and UltraSoC bring the core semiconductor element to that broader story, making it perfectly balanced. Tessent brings IP into the chip to improve test and manufacturability; UltraSoC enhances the validation process and extends that into field deployment. Overall, the combination enables a truly complete design for product lifecycle offering.”