A successful cloud-based EDA solution must contain four essential capabilities:
Scalability
The most significant advantage of moving your EDA workloads to the cloud is the immediate access to massive computing and storage resources. Throughout the chip design process, computing demand fluctuates cyclically and unpredictably. The cloud service provider automates provisioning. The provider also makes it easier to activate as many machines as you need if, for example, you are running static timing analysis or physical verification. You can return the resources to the cloud as soon as you are done, so the use charges stop.
Flexibility
An EDA solution for the cloud should be flexible to accommodate various electronic designs, from tiny IoT devices to the most advanced servers. Some companies will want to outsource everything about cloud management to reap the most productivity benefits. Those with cloud experience might want to manage the process themselves. Some companies may move whole projects to the cloud, while others use it only when needed. In addition, access to EDA licenses on a pay-per-use basis is crucial, as it allows companies the flexibility to run these complex workloads on an on-demand basis. This flexibility also removes the constraint of a finite number of tool licenses and enables customers to elastically scale as needed. Chip designers require flexible EDA solutions that adapt to their changing requirements.
Productivity
Time to market is essential for every company and project. If compute resources are mismanaged or unavailable, you can miss market opportunities and waste infrastructure investments. Organizations must hire and retain staff to support EDA workloads and engineering teams. It is unlikely that in-house data centers can handle modern EDA workloads with the exponential growth of computing requirements. For true productivity, organizations require cloud-based EDA tools. Access to cloud computing and storage resources allows chipmakers to increase productivity.
Security
Many companies can't keep up with the multitude of modern security threats. Since security best practices are constantly changing, companies often don't possess the resources and expertise to keep up.
At the same time, the largest and most profitable tech companies in the cloud industry are investing in the best security. Though many companies were once hesitant to make the jump to the cloud, engineers have discovered that leveraging it for EDA is not only practical but also safe.
