Chip design software (EDA)

Designing the chip, in the software every chip is laid out in

Electronics students often meet this software in a college VLSI lab. A modern chip holds tens of billions of transistors, and no one could place them by hand. Every chip is designed, tested and laid out in special software. It is called electronic design automation, or EDA.

What the software does. EDA tools cover each step of turning an idea into a chip that can be manufactured:

Design: engineers describe the chip's circuits in a hardware description language.

Simulation and verification: the tools run the design in software, to prove it behaves correctly. For very large chips, special machines called emulators imitate the whole chip, so that real software can run on it before it exists.

Synthesis: the tools turn the description into a network of basic logic gates.

Place and route: the tools place billions of transistors on the chip and draw the wires between them.

Sign-off: final checks of timing, power and whether the factory can make the design. After this, the design is sent to the factory. The industry calls that moment tape-out.

A mistake that reaches the factory can cost months and millions of dollars, which is why so much of the work goes into checking. (More on the stages of chip design in Market Segment 35.1, Processor and GPU makers.)

Every step from idea to factory runs in EDA software: design, simulation and verification, synthesis, place and route, and sign-off, before tape-out sends the design to the factory. Emulators let real software run on the chip before it exists.

How the market works. Two companies sell most of the world's EDA software. Chip companies pay for time-limited licences for each engineer, and the licences are expensive. A chip company builds its whole way of working around one set of tools, so it rarely switches. The two leaders also sell ready-made designs for parts of chips. (More on those in Market Segment 35.2, Semiconductor IP companies.)

Circuit boards, the boards that chips are mounted on, are designed in separate, simpler tools.

What gets designed in which tools: the chip itself in software from Cadence and Synopsys Inc., packages, boards and heat in simulation from Cadence System Design and Analysis, and the circuit board in separate, simpler tools such as Altium's.

Where India fits. Both leaders run very large centres in India. India's chip designers already work in their tools.

Every company named here has posted software engineering jobs in India. Famous companies that don't actively hire software engineers in India are left out.

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Chip and circuit-board design software

Chip and circuit-board design software

The two leaders

Cadence

has engineers in the Delhi region, where its Noida centre is, and in Bengaluru and Hyderabad. It sells software to design and verify chips and the systems around them. It also sells emulators. Its Indian centres are among its largest. Cadence has the most job postings in this Market Segment.

Cadence System Design and Analysis

is Cadence's business that simulates circuit boards, chip packages and heat.

Synopsys Inc.

with engineers in Delhi, Bengaluru and Hyderabad, is the other leader. It sells design and verification software, and ready-made designs for parts of chips. Since 2025, it has owned Ansys, the simulation company. (More on simulation software in Market Segment 37.2, CAD and PLM software, in Industry Vertical 37, Manufacturing tech.)

Circuit boards

Altium

now part of Renesas, with engineers in Bengaluru, sells software for designing circuit boards. (More on Renesas in Market Segment 35.4, Analog, power and microcontroller chipmakers.)

AI for analog design

Maieutic Semiconductors

is a Bengaluru start-up building an AI assistant for engineers who design analog chips.

The chip that designs the chip.

The EDA companies were among the first to put machine learning into their tools, to place circuits and tune designs. They now offer AI agents that write verification tests and fix design errors. Much of the world's chip verification is done in India, so this is the most direct change that AI brings to India's chip industry.

That is chip design software: the tools every chip is designed, checked and laid out in, sold by two leading companies that both run very large centres in India.

Who they hire

Who these companies hire, and for what, is on What semiconductor and chip design companies hire for.

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