The 2016 DAC Art Show Grand Prize Winner: Coventor, Inc.

Coventor entered the Art Contest at DAC 2016 to illustrate some of the key advanced capabilities of SEMulator3D, its virtual fabrication software platform. Coventor used SEMulator3D to create a high-resolution, 3-D computer model of 14-nm FinFET transistors across a wide area of SRAM design. In this model, sections were cut out for visibility and artistic effect. A new data interface format (not specifically developed for this purpose) was then used to deliver the 3-D model data to Coventor's collaborators at Stratasys, who printed the sculpture using large-scale, multicolor 3-D printing technology. The team overcame a number of interesting challenges in producing the winning entry, including 3-D printing of a model with nearly 30 different colored semiconductor materials on a printer with only three available colors. The result impressed a panel of judges at the 2016 Design Automation Conference (DAC), where Coventor was awarded first prize for their entry. As the DAC Art Contest Grand Prize Winner, the 14nm FinFET 3D Sculpture produced by Coventor will be on display at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA, USA for one year.