Actel

Actel Corporation was an American manufacturer of nonvolatile, low-power field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs),[4] mixed-signal FPGAs,[5] and programmable logic solutions.[6][7][8] It had its headquarters in Mountain View, California, with offices worldwide. In November 2010, Microsemi acquired Actel for $430 million.[9][10][11][12] In May 2018, Microchip Technology acquired Microsemi.[13]

History and competition

Actel was founded in 1985 and became known for its high-reliability and anti-fuse-based FPGAs, used in the military and aerospace markets.[14]

Actel acquired GateField in 2000, which expanded Actel's anti-fuse FPGA offering to include flash-based FPGAs. Actel announced in 2004 that it had shipped the one-millionth unit of its flash-based ProASICPLUS FPGA.[15]

In 2005, Actel introduced a new technology known as Fusion to bring FPGA programmability to mixed-signal solutions. Fusion was the first technology to integrate mixed-signal analogue capabilities with flash memory and FPGA fabric in a monolithic device.[16]

In 2006, to address the tight power budgets of the portable market, Actel introduced the IGLOO FPGA. The IGLOO family of FPGAs was based on Actel's nonvolatile flash technology and the ProASIC 3 FPGA architecture.[17] Two new IGLOO derivatives were added in 2008: IGLOO PLUS FPGAs with enhanced I/O capabilities, and IGLOO nano FPGAs, a low power solution at 2 μW. A nano version of ProASIC3 also became available in 2008.

In 2010, Actel introduced the SmartFusion line of FPGAs. SmartFusion includes both analogue components and a programmable flash-based logic fabric within the same chip. SmartFusion was the first FPGA product to additionally include a hard ARM processor core.[18]

Altera and Xilinx are the other key players in the market, however, their main focus is on SRAM FPGAs. Lattice Semiconductor is another competitor.[19][20]

Technologies

Actel's portfolio of FPGAs is based on two types of technologies: anti-fuse-based FPGAs (Axcelerator, SX-A, eX, and MX families) and flash-based FPGAs (Fusion, PolarFire, IGLOO, and ProASIC3 families).

Actel's anti-fuse FPGAs have been known for their nonvolatility, live-at power-up operation,[21] single-chip form factor, and security. Actel's flash-based FPGA families include these same characteristics and are also reprogrammable and low power.

Actel also develops system-critical FPGAs (RTAX and ProASIC3 families), including extended temperature automotive, military, and aerospace FPGAs, plus a wide variety of space-class radiation-tolerant devices. These flash and anti-fuse FPGAs have high levels of reliability and firm-error immunity.

Controversy

In March 2012, researchers from the University of Cambridge discovered a backdoor in the JTAG interface of the ProASIC3 family of low-powered FPGAs.[22] They defended their theory at a cryptography workshop held in Belgium in September 2012.[23]

External links

• Corporate website