A practical and efficient method for compare-point matching

An important step in using combinational equivalence checkers to verify sequential designs is identifying and matching corresponding compare-points in the two sequential designs to be verified. Both non-function and function-based matching methods are usually employed in commercial verification tools. In this paper, we describe an heuristic algorithm using ATPG for matching compare-points based on the functionality of the combinational blocks in the sequential designs. Results on industrial-sized circuits show the methods are both practical and efficient.