Leveling Up: A Trajectory of OpenROAD, TILOS and Beyond

Abstract

Since June 2018, the OpenROAD project has developed an open-source, RTL-to-GDS EDA system within the DARPA IDEA program. The tool achieves no-human-in-loop generation of design-rule clean layout in 24 hours. This enables system innovation and design space exploration, while also democratizing hardware design by lowering barriers of cost, expertise and risk. Since November 2021, The Institute for Learning-enabled Optimization at Scale (TILOS), an NSF AI institute for advances in optimization partially supported by Intel, has begun its work toward a "new nexus'' of AI, optimization, and the leading edge of practice for use domains that include IC design. This paper traces a trajectory of "leveling up'' in the research enablement for IC physical design automation and EDA in general. This trajectory has OpenROAD and TILOS as waypoints, and advances themes of openness, infrastructure, and culture change.