EDA is a glue in the disaggregated system, which aggregates manufacturers, foundry providers, and IP providers

Michael J Fister was in India to inaugurate its new
development center in Noida. Prior to joining Cadence, he spent seventeen years
at Intel Corporation, where he was senior vice president and general manager of
the Enterprise Platforms Group. At Intel, he was closely involved in some of the
key initiatives, including the introduction of the Itanium processor family.
Fister is a graduate of the University of Cincinnati, where he received a BS and
an MS in electrical engineering in 1977 and 1978, respectively. He spent his
early years in a variety of executive and engineering management positions at
Wyse, Machine Vision International, and Cincinnati Milacron. He currently sits
on the Board of Directors of Autodesk Corporation and also works closely with
the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. In an interview with Dataquest, Michael
Fister takes a stock of Indian operations and shares the future plans of the
company, which recently completed twenty years of its existence in India

How important is India in your overall global business?

The world is a big place, and India a large part in terms of the consuming
public. The intellectual capital here is vibrant and prolific. Here, we have
customers talking to our developers. We are lucky that we got started in India
very early and have just completed twenty years, and inaugurated another
facility in Noida. India is about 20% of the intellectual capital of our
company. We do active development across different product lines.

India is a melting pot of capabilities. It has the software
element and many chips are now software-hardware products. Companies here have
evolved from doing just pieces of design to managing whole product capabilities
and looking at marketing opportunities for local consumption.

The touch point with a vast consuming population is vital for
us.

EDA is a glue in the disaggregated system, which aggregates
manufacturers, foundry providers, and IP providers. That is why we spend so much
time with the ecosystem.

Do you see any logic in Cadence setting up a fab in India?

The economies around foundries are very complicated. It has to be globally
competitive operations, and current conditions are not favorable due to various
factors including operational and technical challenges. The sourcing of all sub
components is also an issue. This has to do with systems integration.

Salary levels are growing and, according to the DQ Survey,
Cadence is one of the leading paymasters in India. How do you manage the
increasing cost of operations?

The increasing cost is no different from anywhere else in the world. The
longevity is really important and the companies that have operated for more than
twenty years, like Cadence or TI, have an upper hand because they have a
stronger cultural affinity than others. For somebody to start a new company
tomorrow and try to emulate or recreate that is a tough thing to do.

Revenues from Asia are a very small part of Cadences overall
business. What are your strategies to grow in this region?

The growth of our business in Asia has been decent. It will continue to be
relatively small, but we are not investing ahead of big returns.

Can you share your relationship with local IP providers?

There are design, product and verification IP. We have very active
collaboration with companies like ARM and RAMBUs on the design part. We have a
complete technology portfolio, especially in the verification space. In this
part of the world, we see design IP emerging to become verification IP, and this
is very valuable. Verification is an important area as what has been designed
has to be verified correctly. Because of our technology, we are instantly
engageable with those kind of companies. They are prolific here because of the
kind of software base, and they are emerging in other places. On the process IP
side, it is more relevant to Taiwan, China, or the US.

We have a verification alliance program in India wherein we work
with local IP partners.

Any specific future plans for India that you would like to
share?

The investment in Noida has given us headroom for growth for a couple of
years. We have been here for the last twenty years and our commitment to India
is obvious. As the market evolves, we will continue to invest and grow.

Sudesh Prasad

sudeshp@cybermedia.co.in