Synopsys Inc has acquired Stanza Systems Inc, a Cupertino, California-based electronic design automation software firm, it emerged yesterday. The acquisition marks a further move from logical to physical design by Synopsys, begun with the company’s acquisition of Epic Design Systems Inc in January 1997 (CI No 3,080).
Stanza, one of the new breed of deep submicron design tool companies, was founded in 1996 by Chenmin Hu, the company’s president, and has just six employees. Hu was a co-founder of Symmetry Design Systems Inc, eventually acquired by analog and mixed-signal simulation tools Analogy Inc, also in 1996 (CI No 3,029). Stanza’s first deep submicron design tools for IC layouts, PolarSLE and PolarVerify, were introduced in October 1997. Its customers include National Semiconductor Corp, S3 Inc and C-Cube Microsystems Inc.
The acquisition, which closed at the beginning of this week according to reports, was for an undisclosed amount. The addition should enable Synopsys to compete more effectively with Cadence Design Systems Inc and Avant! Corp. Avant! acquired Aceo Technology Inc last year for its deep submicron design tools and Cadence has its Virtuoso layout editor and Diva verification tools. Other competitors include Duet Technologies Inc and Mentor Graphics Corp.
