Abstract
Dynamic IR drop, a transient loss of supply voltage proportional to current (I) and resistance (R), can erode timing margins on advanced process nodes. Decoupling capacitors (decaps) inserted near cells with high switching activity can suppress the drop. The regions that need decaps, however, tend toward heavy routing congestion, so a newly placed decap can trigger detailed routing design rule violations (DRVs). An example routability-aware method selects decap locations and bounded cell moves through a linear program built from measured routing data. The method models cell currents as rectangular envelopes over binned time, computes a missing charge from a charge balance, and reads a routing cost from historical trial-route data. Slack variables mark the tiles whose relief calls for manual extension of power grid straps instead. The method thereby addresses IR drop and routing congestion together at the post-placement stage.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Pendyala, Prateek, "Routability-Aware Decoupling Capacitor Insertion Using Trial-Route Lookups and Linear Programming", Technical Disclosure Commons, (September 16, 2026)
https://www.tdcommons.org/dpubs_series/11742