Quest can be used to extract resistance, inductance, capacitance and conductance (RLGC) parameters from GDSII or CIF layout files. It works in the microwave range and supports chips running as fast as 80 GHz. Quest can also be used to characterize interconnect and process variations or to create transmission-line Spice models, including the "W" models used in signal-integrity analysis.

The tool can be used by both designers and process engineers, said Rashid Salik, director of development for parasitic extraction tools at Silvaco. Designers, he said, might want to look at the impact of spacing and width, or examine clock or bus routing. Process engineers can examine the impact of silicon processes and substrates.

Quest uses fast 2-D simulation and can accept a GDSII file of any size, Salik said. Users issue a command telling the tool where to characterize transmission lines.

While most extraction tools focus on resistance and capacitance, Quest goes further. "Beyond 1 GHz, you have to extract the inductance," he said. "Many published papers have highlighted the effects of inductance on delay and signal integrity."

Conductance, Salik said, is important if users are looking at the impact of organic or low-k dielectric materials.

Ivan Pesic, Silvaco's president and chief executive officer, said one distinction of Quest is its ability to provide frequency-dependent RLGC parameters. Most tools consider those parameters to be constant, which is a "big mistake," Pesic said, because they vary so much with frequency.

Pesic also claimed Quest is the first tool to generate and optimize W models automatically. Developed relatively recently, W models are lumped-element Spice models that can be used across a large frequency range. Pesic said the W models can be used in any Spice simulator that supports them.

The input to Quest is a GDSII file and a process description. The tool accepts user-defined layouts via a parameterized layout editor, and any parameter can take a variable value. Quest supports user-specified material properties, multiple dielectrics (including low-k materials), multiple metal materials and any conductor shape.

The 2-D field solver supports a user-specified frequency or range of frequencies. Accuracy control lets users trade off simulation speed vs. accuracy, and users can select nets to probe for parasitics.

Pesic said he decided to make Quest available on the eECAD Web site because the cost of sales is so high for traditional licensing. "It takes a three- to six-month evaluation, and I'm trying to avoid that. I want to put this on eECAD and say 'Here it is, available for $15 per run, and you can run as many copies as you want.' "

Further, Pesic said, Quest is a tool that most companies need only occasionally -- and when they do, they may need many copies. "It's really the perfect tool for eECAD," he said. With conventional licensing, Quest would probably start around $70,000, he said.

Pesic was the founder of eECAD, but the new Web-based company does not have any Silvaco ownership, and it distributes tools from multiple EDA vendors. Quest is available now and runs on Unix, Linux and Windows NT platforms.