Physical design (electronics)

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In electronics, physical design is the process of converting RTL (VHDL/Verilog) code to silicon. Modern day Integrated Circuit (IC) design is split up into Front-end design using HDL's, Verification and Back-end Design or Physical Design. The next step after Physical Design is the Manufacturing process or Fabrication Process that is done in the Wafer Fabrication Houses. Fab-houses fabricate designs onto silicon die which are then packaged into ICs.

Each of the phases mentioned above have Design Flows associated with them. These Design Flows lay down the process and guide-lines/framework for that phase. Physical Design flow uses the technology libraries that are provided by the fabrication houses. These technology files provide information regarding the type of Silicon wafer used, the standard-cells used, the layout rules, etc. Technologies range from 2μm, 1μm , 0.5μm , 0.35μm, 0.25μm, 180nm, 130nm, 90m and 65nm in terms of MOSFET size. Apart from this we have the n-Well process, Twin-well process, SOI, MEMS processes.