Xilinx 20nm Portfolio Strategy Announcement Frequently Asked Questions

Xilinx 20nm Portfolio Strategy Announcement

Frequently Asked Questions

1.      What is Xilinx announcing?

Xilinx is announcing its strategy for its 20nm portfolio, including next-generation 8 series All Programmable FPGAs and second generation 3D ICs and SoCs. The 20nm portfolio is building on breakthroughs established at 28nm to provide an extra generation of system performance, low power and programmable system integration relative to traditional FPGA node migrations.

2.      What is an All Programmable FPGA/SoC/3D IC?

Xilinx has moved from being just a programmable logic company to an All Programmable company— employing ‘All’ forms of programmable technologies—going well beyond programmable hardware to software, beyond digital to analog mixed signal (AMS), and beyond single die to multi-die 3D IC implementations. The three categories of All Programmable devices are:

·        All Programmable FPGA: Traditional programmable logic with programmable analog, DSP, transceivers and other capabilities

·        All Programmable SoC: Complete processor systems integrated on a single die with FPGA fabric.

·        All Programmable 3D IC: Leveraging 3D stacked silicon to expand integration past traditional FPGA barriers with functionality such as high-speed transceivers, memory, etc.

3.      What are the 20nm product portfolio’s target applications? 

Xilinx is optimizing its 20nm All Programmable portfolio to address the requirements of next-generation, ever ‘smarter’, more integrated, bandwidth hungry systems.  These applications include:

·         intelligent Nx100G - 400G wired networks

·         smart, adaptive, and cognitive LTE Advanced wireless radios, baseband, and backhaul equipment

·         high throughput, low-power data center storage, intelligent networking, and highly integrated low latency application acceleration

·         image/video processing and ‘embedded vision’ for next-generation displays, professional cameras, factory automation, advanced automotive driver assistance, and surveillance systems

·         leading edge connectivity for almost every application imaginable. 

4.      What does Xilinx mean by “A Generation Ahead"?

In order to understand the true value of 20nm to Xilinx products and customer applications, it is important to understand the technology innovations that created an extra generation of value at 28nm.  Rather than simply move to the next node with traditional FPGAs, Xilinx engineered numerous FPGA innovations and pioneered the first commercial All Programmable 3D ICs and SoCs. This new generation of devices has now been proven with hundreds of customers and means that Xilinx is benefiting from a multi-year head start over its competition in the introduction and customer adoption of these breakthrough technologies. This is allowing Xilinx to infuse the added value of 20nm to the technologies pioneered and proven at 28nm, keeping customers a generation ahead.

5.      What key benefits does 20nm bring to FPGAs?

Next-generation FPGAs will leverage TSMC’s 20nm SoC process with similar performance/watt characteristics of the HPL process at 28nm. They will enable:

·         2x system level performance

·         2x the memory bandwidth

·         half the total power

·         1.5x more integration of logic functions and critical system building blocks.

Designers will be able to leverage higher speed fabric and second generation system-optimized transceivers in high-performance applications, while developers of wireless LTE, DSP and image/video applications can leverage its faster DSP, BRAM, and DDR4 memory interfaces.

All applications will benefit from Xilinx’s next-generation routing architecture that easily extends resource utilization beyond 90 percent for higher quality-of-results and faster design closure.

6.      How will Xilinx’s SoCs compare to today’s Zynq™-7000 devices?

Xilinx will be delivering significantly higher system performance with a new heterogeneous processing system. This embedded system will be coupled to the next-generation FPGA fabric with >2x the interconnect bandwidth. On-chip analog mixed signal performance will double, while programmable I/O will be upgraded with next-generation DDR4 and PCI Express® interfaces. SoC level power and security management will complement this new level of embedded processing performance and I/O bandwidth.

7.      How will Xilinx be leveraging its 3D IC technology at 20nm?

Xilinx will be extending its 3D IC architecture with a two-level interface, enabling both homogeneous and heterogeneous die integration based on open industry standards. This will result in increased logic capacity of >1.5x or 30-40M ASIC equivalent gate designs.  In addition, these devices will feature 4x the transceiver bandwidth, leveraging > 33 Gb/s transceivers (ultimately going to 56 Gb/s), DDR4 high-performance memory interfaces, and integrated memory die with wide, high bandwidth, low power interfaces will enable the highest performance applications.

8.      What are the benefits of ‘co-optimization’ with the Vivado™ Design Suite?

By architecting and optimizing the tools, devices, and IP together, designers can extract maximum value out of the silicon while shortening their design and implementation process. As a result, these next-generation 20nm FPGAs, second generation SoCs and second generation 3D ICs will deliver an extra node of performance gains, significantly lower power, and the highest levels of programmable systems integration, while further accelerating the time to integration and implementation.

9.      Why is Xilinx announcing 20nm generation plans now?

Most leading-edge customers are already planning their next-generation system architectures with their implementation and shipment of designs targeting Xilinx’s 28nm products underway. Understanding the capabilities of Xilinx’s next-generation product portfolio will enable them to begin making architectural and other decisions.

10.  When will the 20nm families be available in software and when will they begin shipping?

Xilinx will be announcing more specifics by family as the portfolio is rolled out. Xilinx is already engaging with strategic customers on its first 20nm FPGA with restricted access to product definitions and documentation.