IITG develops 'LEAP' to boost semiconductor industry

Guwahati: A team of researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Guwahati (IIT Guwahati) has created a new machine learning tool called 'LEAP' that could greatly improve how microchips, or Integrated Circuits (ICs), are designed. This is a big deal for the $600 billion semiconductor industry, which is behind the technology in all modern electronic devices.

Designing these microchips is a complex process that relies on special software to turn high-level designs into a form that can be manufactured. However, the current methods often use quick problem-solving strategies that may not always give the best results. To make this process faster and better, Prof. Chandan Karfa and Dr. Sukanta Bhattacharjee, along with their team at IIT Guwahati, developed LEAP.

LEAP helps to speed up the design process by using machine learning to focus on the most promising design options, cutting down the time spent on evaluation by over 50%. Prof. Chandan Karfa explains, "Our tool not only makes the design process faster but also improves the performance of the circuits. We've managed to reduce the time it takes to design by half and improved circuit performance without needing extra space, making it a big step forward in microchip design."

Instead of checking hundreds of design possibilities, LEAP smartly picks and evaluates only the top options, making the process more efficient. In tests on 21 different designs, LEAP showed it could cut design time by 50% and reduce the number of options checked by over half. Compared to older methods, LEAP achieves similar performance but with 63% fewer checks, making the open-source design tool it works with much faster.

This research, published in a top conference on computer-aided design, is expected to have a significant impact on the semiconductor industry. By making microchip design faster and more efficient, LEAP can lead to quicker, more powerful, and energy-efficient electronic devices, benefiting both consumers and the broader technology industry.

This development highlights IIT Guwahati's role in advancing technology and could pave the way for future breakthroughs in the semiconductor field.