The Beginning of Breakfast Bytes

Yes, it’s true. The Cadence gravitational field finally pulled me back and I am now blogging here at Cadence.com. I’m being thrown in at the deep end since Cadence has a big announcement with imec (see next post), it’s the Jasper User Group Conference the next couple of days, Memcon next week. It was Si2Con and the Linley Microprocessor conference today, where Cadence made an announcement in embedded vision, but trying to cover those at the same time as getting a badge and finding my office was a step too far.

A one paragraph background for those of you that don’t know me. Most recently I have been blogging at Semiwiki.com. But I have 30 years in the industry in engineering, management and marketing positions. My last stint at Cadence, I ran Custom IC for a year and was a member of the Strategic Technology Office reporting to the then CEO. My big tenure was at VLSI Technology and its Compass subsidiary, where I worked for 16 years both in the US and in France, ending up as the CEO of Compass. I like to say that, as a result, “I have silicon in my veins.” I was VP of Engineering at Ambit and so my first tenure at Cadence was a result of Ambit's acquisition.

Unfortunately, my first blog also brings some bad news. Pat Pistilli is the founder of the Design Automation Conference, DAC, back in 1964, when it was still called the Society for Avoiding Redundant Effort (SHARE). Together with his wife Marie, he founded MP Associates, which has run DAC ever since. The two of them were in a bad car crash in Colorado over the weekend. The local press reports that Marie was taken to Longmont Hospital with “serious injuries”. Pat was also taken to the hospital with “moderate injuries”. Our hopes go out to them both for a swift and safe recovery.