Core Viewpoint - The article provides a comprehensive overview of the chip design process, emphasizing its complexity and the various stages involved in transforming electronic systems into physical integrated circuits. It highlights the importance of both front-end and back-end design, as well as the tools and methodologies used in the industry. Group 1: Basic Concepts of Chip Design - Chip design is a crucial pre-step in chip manufacturing, involving multiple stages of collaboration and strict validation [8][11] - The design process can be categorized into digital chip design and analog chip design, with a focus on digital chip design in this article [11] - The design hierarchy includes system level, register transfer level (RTL), gate level, transistor level, layout level, and mask level [11][12] Group 2: Chip Design Process - The chip design process consists of four main stages: specification design, system design, front-end design, and back-end design [25][21] - The current mainstream approach is top-down design, starting from system-level design and moving to RTL design [24] - The output of the design process includes specifications, design plans, netlists, layouts, and masks [21][23] Group 3: Front-End Design - Front-end design focuses on converting functional requirements into realizable circuit logic, ensuring functional correctness without considering physical implementation details [29] - Key steps in front-end design include HDL coding, simulation verification, logic synthesis, static timing analysis, and formal verification [52][60][68] - Tools used in front-end design include HDL simulators, logic synthesis tools, and static timing analysis tools [28] Group 4: Back-End Design - Back-end design is based on the netlist obtained from front-end design, focusing on creating the physical layout [72] - Key steps in back-end design include layout planning, physical layout, clock tree synthesis, routing, and physical verification [72][76][97] - The final output of back-end design is the GDSII file, which is used for manufacturing the chip [108] Group 5: Market and Industry Insights - The global chip design market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.8% from 2020 to 2024, with the market size surpassing $480 billion by 2024 [39] - The share of the Chinese market in chip design is rapidly increasing, rising from 19% to 28% [39] - Major players in the EDA industry include Synopsys, Cadence, and Siemens EDA, which collectively hold over 70% market share [38]