white paper
Verification data analytics with machine learning
Verification is a data problem, where machine learning is a powerful tool that is dramatically changing the way how verification can be done.
This whitepaper provides an overview on the importance of data to ML, the available data for verification, and the existing applications of ML in verification. It reveals that data itself may dictate applicable ML models. Machine learning has demonstrated great potential in verification. However, attention should be paid to generalizing and scaling the models to ensure their success in a production environment. And a data strategy to build the verification data assets will ensure the long-term success of applying ML in verification.
Introduction
Ever-increasing design complexity and shortening design-to-market time has demanded faster and more accurate functional verification. Industry surveys indicate that design engineers spend about half of their time on functional verification, and the situation has not improved over the years.
Increasing efforts have been spent on improving verification performance to reverse this trend. With more data gathered from an IC design’s life cycle, it is now possible to gain unprecedented insight by analyzing the data with machine learning (ML).
Recent advances in ML, especially the emergence of large ML models, afford the possibility of gaining knowledge in solving verification problems beyond individual projects or designs. Verification is a data problem, whereas ML is a powerful tool dramatically changing how verification can be done.