Italy
Contact Person: Mr Luigi Abbondandolo
Tel.: +39 069 72 31 046
Fax: +39 069 72 32 009
E-Mail: iris@mclink.it
Web Address: http://aimi.dist.unige.it/IRIS/index.htm
or http://www.iris.audio.it
| Turn over of the company
(1998) |
1.2 MECU |
| % Turn over Digital ASICs
(1998) |
0.3 MECU |
| % Turn over Analog and
Mixed Signal ASICs (1998) |
0 |
| Total number of personnel |
20 |
| Number of ASIC designers |
5 |
|
|
| Type of workstations |
HP series 700, Pentium-based
PC |
| Design tools |
Mentor Idea stations
(schematic design entry, VHDL compiler, Quicksim II and QVPRO simulators)
Cadence and Synopsys
Verilog simulators, Synopsys synthesis tools |
Experience (during
the last 2 to 3 years)
Application
domains
IRIS
is a research centre founded in 1988 by Bontempi-Farfisa group, one of
the largest European musical instruments manufacturer, both acoustics and
electronics. The main scope of IRIS was the research of new methodologies
to be used in electronic musical instruments production, designing special
purposes Digital Signal Processors, relevant software development environment
and high-end programmable musical workstation for Computer Music.
IRIS main customers have been the group Companies Bontempi and Farfisa,
but since the last three years, IRIS is acting as an ASIC Design Centre
for SMEs located in the central part of Italy and partner in the relevant
TTN.
Experience
in: RTL Coding, VHDL Design & Simulation, Synthesis, Test Strategy
and Test Implementation, Layout, Implementation of Cores and Megafunctions,
Mixed Signal Experience
Technologies
used: Digital CMOS, 0.35 to 1 um Analog CMOS
Experts
in
-
FPGA
Design: such a type of component (Altera, Actel, Lattice, Quicklogic,
Xilinx...) is widely utilized in IRIS for prototyping. All the pertinent
development tools are available in IRIS.
-
ASIC
Design: for what ASICs is concerned, in the last years a broad line
of DSPs of very different complexity, ranging from 5k gate to 400k gate
(widely utilized for Farfisa and Bontempi products) has been developed.
This apart "interface" circuits and some ASICs for external customers.
Utilized foundries have been Toshiba, Nec, ST, Texas, ES2, Samsung and
the EUROPRACTICE MPW.
-
PCB
design: expertise in both digital and analog systems design.
The "average'" digital board has 6 or 8 layers, and is densely populated
by micro controllers, DSPs, interface logic, and very often has a Digital
to Analog and Analog to Digital high resolution conversion section.
-
Software
Design: many packages have been developed, the most significant being
an Embedded Real Time Operating System for the Motorola 68302 processor,
and ARES, the powerful Interactive Graphic Development Environment of MARS
system, a musical workstation that allows a very easy real-time creation
and editing of any kind of sound-producing algorithms.
-
Algorithm
Development: mainly - but not limited to - for digital signal processing
Number
of ASIC designs per year : 2
Typical
examples of realized projects
-
x20,
fully synchronous, open architecture, VLIW (64 instruction bits), hardwired
instruction for recurring useful functions such as wave table reading,
samples interpolation. For music application a sing X20 produces
and elaborates more audio signal than 5 Motorola 56000. The above
chip has been utilized for building several high performance musical boards.
A huge amount of software, developed to fully utilize the power of X20
and associated systems, is a good example of IRIS capabilities in this
application field.
-
BEKS,
a special purpose DSP-based custom chip. This is an example of design
for third parties, implemented using the EUROPRACTICE (in particular ICEMAN)
services. Around the custom DST a good bunch of dedicated peripherals
optimize the communication with the external world. So the chip contains
a programmable (CPI; ISA;PCMCIA...) PC bus interface, a fast parallel port
for external memories (DRAM; RAM ...) or other logic devices, dedicated
serial ports for data acquisition from up to 40 external Analog to Digital
converters and data sending to any number of external Digital to Analog
converters, a special port for data exchange with an eventual supplementary
external DST. Using this chip the final customer has developed a
very powerful acquisition system for medical applications.>
Other
activities
General
description of the company
IRIS is a small enterprise,
located close to Rome, whose principal customer for musical applications
is the Bontempi-Farfisa Group, the owner of IRIS, one of the largest (and
surviving) European manufacturer of electronic and acoustic musical instruments.
Serving this group and other customers, mainly Smells located in the central
part of Italy, has brought IRIS to build up a deep experience in digital
system hardware design digital audio-signal processing, real time software
design and man-machine interface software. Therefore IRIS has a good
experience in PCB (system) and Integrated Circuit design for Digital Signal
Processing applied to Sound Generation for electronic keyboards and synthesizers.
IRIS has 20 employees,
16 of which are graduated Scientists and Senior/Junior Designers.