September EDA Updates: What MPW Teams Should Check Before Handoff
Synopsys and Cadence announced TSMC ecosystem updates on September 23. Here is what first-silicon teams should record for their own process and verification flow.
- →What the two announcements say
- →What to record before your own handoff
- →Practice catching a stale report
On September 23, 2026, Synopsys and Cadence each announced expanded work with TSMC on advanced-node design enablement. For a team planning its first MPW submission, the immediate lesson is practical: confirm the exact process, tool flow, design-kit version and signoff requirements for its own route.
What the two announcements say
Synopsys’ September 23 announcement covers certified A14 flows, AI-assisted engineering workflows, CoWoS support for multi-die design and multiphysics signoff. It also describes continued work on co-packaged optics and advanced-node IP.
Cadence’s September 23 announcement describes certified A14 tool solutions, UALink and other silicon-proven IP, and work on AI-assisted and multi-die design flows.
These are vendor-reported ecosystem developments. Neither announcement establishes an MPW reservation, price or process-access entitlement for a particular customer. It also does not establish that MST offers those advanced nodes or vendor-certified flows.
What to record before your own handoff
- Process: record the foundry, exact process option and permitted PDK revision. A node label alone is insufficient.
- Verification: obtain the coordinator’s accepted tool and rule-deck requirements. Record the deck and tool versions used for each report.
- Layout identity: match the reports to the submitted layout hash, top cell and revision.
- Package and test: agree what will be delivered and how first silicon will be powered, accessed and measured.
Practice catching a stale report
In our GDSII, DRC and LVS handoff tutorial, two synthetic layout revisions show how a plausible report can refer to an older file. The Report Revision Check compares declared report metadata with the selected file’s checksum. It does not execute DRC or LVS and cannot certify a foundry submission.
For an actual MPW enquiry, use the PDK requirement checklist and obtain current confirmation from the responsible provider. The four-step handoff procedure above is MST’s editorial application of the announcements, not an additional vendor claim.
Reviewed September 27, 2026. Event date: September 23, 2026. Original announcements are linked above.
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