Front End ASIC Design or Back End Design JOB,

Hi All,

I was trying to do pros and cons of Front end ASIC design vs Back end.
Can you please help me in deciding which job should I choose?
Can you tell me which one has more scope in the long run?
Which one is less likely to get outsourced to countries like India and China?
How about verification is it equally prone to outsource?

The pros for Front end is :
1. Gain in lot of domain knowledge/expertise.
2. The major level of RnD effort goes in this and is prime to any product development.
Cons:
3. However once the system has been designed it just needs coding which can be very well done by anyone?
4.These days actual design is very rare and mostly integration of IP happens.So it remains more or less a verification job.

For Back end:
Pros:
1. Involves lot of tools knowledge and knowledge for CMOS process and deep-submicron technologies.
2. Knowledge of layouts and other things is very helpful to get into other aspects of design. One can do memory designs and get diversified into memory design career. A layout expert can as well get into mixed signal design and analog design IP.Easier to shift.

Cons:
However at the base level it just needs lot of tools and tools knowledge which can be easily outsourced to foundries and backend houses in asian countries.


Please understand no offence intended here.
Your help will be very useful.

Thanks
KG

kgeorge123 said:

Hi All,

I was trying to do pros and cons of Front end ASIC design vs Back end.
Can you please help me in deciding which job should I choose?
Can you tell me which one has more scope in the long run?
Which one is less likely to get outsourced to countries like India and China?
How about verification is it equally prone to outsource?

The pros for Front end is :
1. Gain in lot of domain knowledge/expertise.
2. The major level of RnD effort goes in this and is prime to any product development.
Cons:
3. However once the system has been designed it just needs coding which can be very well done by anyone?
4.These days actual design is very rare and mostly integration of IP happens.So it remains more or less a verification job.

For Back end:
Pros:
1. Involves lot of tools knowledge and knowledge for CMOS process and deep-submicron technologies.
2. Knowledge of layouts and other things is very helpful to get into other aspects of design. One can do memory designs and get diversified into memory design career. A layout expert can as well get into mixed signal design and analog design IP.Easier to shift.

Cons:
However at the base level it just needs lot of tools and tools knowledge which can be easily outsourced to foundries and backend houses in asian countries.


Please understand no offence intended here.
Your help will be very useful.

Thanks
KG

Click to expand...

I think, now you must have 5+ years of experience in VLSI Domain. So, guide me with my confusion between BE and FE domain below.


Hi, I am Dhaval from Bangalore, India.
Currently I am doing internship in Analog Design Domain at Honeywell Technology Solutions Lab, Bangalore as a part of my 2nd year M.Tech. Microelectronics. My M.Tech. will be over in May-2012. I have a job offer in VLSI company in which I have to choose between Front end Design or Back end design.

For Front end Design :
They mainly work on Verilog and System Verilog for design and verification.

For Back end Design:

It is Analog and Mixed Signal Design. They are using cadence tools or Design Compiler.
They mainly work on:
Schematic entry, layout, LVS, DRC, STA, RC Extraction etc...means full backend design flow.


So, My confusion is which one to choose. I have basic knowledge of both. Like in FE I know basic vhdl and verilog. In Back end i had done CMOS Invertor in cadence (from schematic to layout to lvs and drc).

I found back end more chellenging comparatively froent end. I mean any one who knows C/C++ very well can do FE design by using free wares but every one cant do back end design.

So, My question is that which one is better (I mean for the future perspective ).
Which field is high paying field.
Based on your suggestion i am going to choose my field and in mean time i will concentrate in that field.

Any inputs are highly appreciable.

Every domain has challenges. The most important thing is which one interests you. You are working in Design for Internship right does it challenge you ?

My M.Tech. will be over in May-2012

Click to expand...

I think its already done!