September 9, 2003 - Minneapolis, MN - USA. Silicore Corporation announced today the adoption of an open source business model for semiconductor IP. According to Wade Peterson, Silicore President and CEO: "We have been studying the semiconductor market for some time now, and have concluded that the best way to create and distribute soft IP is under an open source business model. It's the same model that's used by Red Hat and other GNU/Linux distributors. Until now we've operated under a traditional software business model that's been used by companies like Microsoft and Oracle. Under that approach we viewed IP as a product, but now we see it as a service. We believe that System-on-Chip [SoC] integrators will prefer this model because it lowers costs, simplifies licensing, reduces parts obsolescence, improves security and allows them more control over their system level IP."
In a related move, Silicore released its SLC1657 microcontroller core under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LPGL). VHDL source code and documentation are now available on the Silicore website. Originally released in 1998, the SLC1657 is a complete 8-bit RISC processor solution for use on FPGA or ASIC devices. Typical applications include sensors, medical devices and consumer electronics.
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