4 ms·

The size of the market was continuously growing from the 80s, we're producing more hardware with several architectures these days than before.

PaulHoule 4y ago
There is size in terms of the dollar spend and then there is the number of people involved. These folks say current spend on EDA tools is a bit over $10 billion https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/electronic-design-automation-eda-tools-market https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/electron... This other report claims spend on software development tools is closer to $4B today. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/19/2424149/0/en/Software-Development-Tools-Market-Size-Booming-at-a-CAGR-of-14-5-During-2022-2027-Extensive-Research-by-Industry-Size-Recent-Developments-Market-Position-Growth-Drivers-Business-Op.html https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/19/242414... Frankly I don't know if those numbers are accurate but I am pretty sure there are many more people employed developing software than in developing microchips by a large margin. On the other hand, a lot of people develop software with no-cost tools such as GCC, Eclipse, Xcode, Visual Studio Code, ... My guess is that the software market is open to disruptive innovation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_innovation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_innovation but EDA isn't. I think there is a big market for programming languages that are strong in some areas but weak in others. For instance, Python is pretty slow compared to C, but that doesn't bother many users. Since Python has become so popular it has, over time, closed that gap with tools like numpy, numba, Cython, Pypy, etc. A company like Intel, on the other hand, is going to need high performance from their parts and the tools that make them. In principle they might like the idea of something that's built on a better foundation, but today they need all the features of the tools they have. There might be some customer that would benefit from new EDA tools with potential to grow in the future that could tolerate tools that aren't mature in every respect -- that's the opportunity for something new.

PaulHoule 4y ago

There is size in terms of the dollar spend and then there is the number of people involved. These folks say current spend on EDA tools is a bit over $10 billion https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/electronic-design-automation-eda-tools-market https://www.mordorintelligence.com/industry-reports/electron... This other report claims spend on software development tools is closer to $4B today. https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/19/2424149/0/en/Software-Development-Tools-Market-Size-Booming-at-a-CAGR-of-14-5-During-2022-2027-Extensive-Research-by-Industry-Size-Recent-Developments-Market-Position-Growth-Drivers-Business-Op.html https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2022/04/19/242414... Frankly I don't know if those numbers are accurate but I am pretty sure there are many more people employed developing software than in developing microchips by a large margin. On the other hand, a lot of people develop software with no-cost tools such as GCC, Eclipse, Xcode, Visual Studio Code, ... My guess is that the software market is open to disruptive innovation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_innovation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disruptive_innovation but EDA isn't. I think there is a big market for programming languages that are strong in some areas but weak in others. For instance, Python is pretty slow compared to C, but that doesn't bother many users. Since Python has become so popular it has, over time, closed that gap with tools like numpy, numba, Cython, Pypy, etc. A company like Intel, on the other hand, is going to need high performance from their parts and the tools that make them. In principle they might like the idea of something that's built on a better foundation, but today they need all the features of the tools they have. There might be some customer that would benefit from new EDA tools with potential to grow in the future that could tolerate tools that aren't mature in every respect -- that's the opportunity for something new.