AI and High-Performance Computing
AI chip design and high-performance computing: device and fab solutions for compute silicon
AI chip design needs the newest transistors and a die that survives its own power and heat: with Silvaco tools you develop the FinFET or gate-all-around device, see where the die sags or overheats, and optimize the fab process behind it.
Where AI and HPC silicon gets hard
AI accelerators and data center chips are where the hardest parts of semiconductor development meet. Advanced CMOS transistors, high-bandwidth memory stacked beside the logic, chiplets, and the advanced package that holds them together each have to work on their own. Then they have to work as one product.
Power and heat decide whether that product can be built. A large compute die pulls heavy current through its supply network. That current heats the silicon, and the heat shifts how your transistors and wires behave. A design can simulate clean and still sag or run hot. Find that out after tapeout and you’re paying for a re-spin.
Where Silvaco fits
From the transistor to the die’s power and heat, then on to the fab when yield becomes the question.
Your node and your die
Process, transistor and layout
Technologies and devices
The transistor, the memory beside it, the power and heat on the die, and the fab that makes it.
Advanced logic
Develop planar CMOS, FinFET and gate-all-around transistors in Victory TCAD, which took on advanced CMOS in its 2024 release.
Digital twin modeling comes with it, plus an atomistic quantum transport approach for gate-all-around devices.
High-bandwidth memory
HBM sits in Silvaco’s memory coverage next to 3D NAND, DRAM, flash and RRAM.
You model the memory device in the same Victory TCAD tools you use for the logic.
Power and thermal
InVar’s thermal engine feeds temperature back into the IR-drop result, from a single cell up to the full chip.
Hierarchical block models keep a large design quick to analyze without losing flat-run accuracy. Nothing needs pre-characterizing first.
Fab-level yield
FTCO trains AI/ML models on TCAD physics and your fab data until they behave like your process: a digital twin you can experiment on.
You use it for virtual experiments, design targeting and yield analysis. Micron already runs it in memory development.
Applications
From the transistor to signoff to the fab.
Advanced logic device development
FinFET and gate-all-around transistors, compared in simulation while the process is still open.
HBM and memory interface work
Device work on the DRAM that HBM stacks beside the processor.
Full-chip IR-drop and thermal signoff
Supply drop and temperature, from each block to the assembled chip.
Fab technology co-optimization for compute silicon
Process calibration and optimization against fab data, when yield is on the line.
Results and reading for compute silicon
Post-layout runtime on a FinFET flow, gate-all-around device simulation, power integrity, and
a digital twin at a memory maker.
Customer
February 2022
eTopus
Builds ultra-high-speed mixed-signal IP that goes into data center and high-performance computing chips, on a FinFET flow where full post-layout simulations ran for weeks.
“…a full simulation on one of our blocks would run 20+ days. After using Jivaro Pro this runtime was reduced to 6 days…”
Harry Chan, Founder and CEO, eTopus
Press release
February 2022
Silvaco Expands its Victory TCAD and Digital Twin Modeling Platform to Planar CMOS, FinFET and Advanced CMOS Technologies
The 2024 TCAD Baseline Release adds gate-all-around support, digital twin modeling and atomistic simulation, with AI and high-performance computing among its target markets.
Webinar · FTCO
February 2022
Learn How Micron Utilizes Silvaco's Fab Technology Co-Optimization for Development and Manufacturing of Memory Technologies
Micron's Sumeet Pandey on building a digital twin of the fab for DRAM and 3D NAND. Stress modeling, sensitivity analysis and virtual process models all feed it.
Talk · SURGE 2026
February 2022
Advanced Logic FinFET/Nanosheet Simulation with Silvaco Victory Tools
Zhejiang University's Professor Zhenhua Wu shows FinFET and gate-all-around nanosheet simulation in Victory tools, for nodes below 3 nm.
Webinar · Advanced CMOS
February 2022
Utilizing Silvaco TCAD for 3D Silicon Simulation
3D CMOS and memory process steps in Victory Process and FinFET characterization in Victory Device, then Victory DoE and Victory Analytics to refine the results.
Product brief · PDF
February 2022
InVar Power - EM/IR - Thermal
Power integrity signoff, early and final, on digital, analog and mixed-signal ICs. Every device and every wire gets its own temperature.n space.
More on compute silicon
Webinar · 2017
Get a Head Start on Reliability Analysis Early in Your Design Cycle
Webinar · 2016
Power Distribution Network Analysis for Layout Engineers
IP brief · TSMC N3P
Ultra High-Speed Cache Memory Compiler, 2-Port Register File
Webinar · 2020
Choosing the Right DDR Memory Subsystem for Your Next SOC!
Where does your die run hot?
Or maybe the harder problem is a gate-all-around transistor you can’t characterize yet. Bring
either one, and an application engineer will work through it with you on your own structure
or design.
AI chip design and HPC silicon, answered
What semiconductor challenges are specific to AI and HPC silicon?
Three things share one package: FinFET or gate-all-around transistors, high-bandwidth memory, and the advanced packaging that joins them. The die draws so much current that its own heat starts shifting device and wire behavior. In AI chip design, power delivery and temperature often decide whether a design can be built and still meet its targets.
How is IR drop and thermal analyzed on a large compute die?
Together, because current heats the die and temperature shifts resistance and current in return. InVar works on the transistor-level design with no pre-characterization, builds hierarchical block models and assembles a full-chip result from them. InVar Prime runs an early analysis while the floorplan is still open, so you can move blocks if the numbers come back bad.
What is high-bandwidth memory and what does it require from design tools?
High-bandwidth memory stacks DRAM dies and connects them to a processor over a very wide interface, usually inside an advanced package. Designing with it touches memory device development, power delivery and packaging at once. Its dies are DRAM, which Victory TCAD simulates at device level, and HBM appears in Silvaco's memory coverage by name.
Which Silvaco tools apply to advanced logic nodes?
At device level, Victory Process builds planar, FinFET and gate-all-around structures and Victory Device simulates them. Both gained gate-all-around coverage and digital twin modeling in 2024. InVar then signs off power integrity and temperature on the finished design. FTCO carries the same physics to the fab and optimizes the process itself.
What is Fab Technology Co-Optimization?
Fab Technology Co-Optimization (FTCO) combines physics-based TCAD simulation with AI/ML and fab data into a digital twin of a process. Process engineers run virtual experiments and yield analysis on it without waiting on a TCAD specialist for every answer. Micron uses it in DRAM and 3D NAND development.
Does Silvaco work at the leading edge nodes?
Yes, in several places. Victory TCAD has handled gate-all-around transistors since 2024, and InVar covers every process node, FinFET included. Silvaco's own IP is published at TSMC N3P too, among it an ultra-high-speed 2-port register file compiler. For your specific node and flow, check with our technical experts before you start an evaluation.
Related
FTCO
Fab Technology Co-Optimization, with AI/ML and TCAD physics calibrated to your fab.
TCAD
Victory Process and Victory Device, with atomistic simulation for gate-all-around work.
InVar
Power integrity and thermal signoff, early in the floorplan and again at the end.
Advanced Packaging
Where the logic, the memory and the package come together.
Logic and Memory
Advanced CMOS and memory, high-bandwidth memory included.