The April EDAC mixer was held at the Sonoma Chicken Coop in San Jose, CA. A portion of the proceeds from the EDAC mixers benefits local charities. Recent mixers have supported the Mountain View Educational Foundation (MVEF) and the Resource Area for Teaching (RAFT).

The Emerging Companies Committee continues to host exciting events with information especially useful for start-ups. Upcoming events include additional installments of the popular EDAC - Jim Hogan series, including " Naked and Afraid - the Search for Capital" in May and "Alternative Sources of Funding for Emerging Companies" scheduled for the fall.

Previous installments of the EDAC - Jim Hogan series are available in the EDAC media library.

In April 2014, the ECC, hosted a panel on "new media". A recording of the event is available on the EDAC web site.

On April 8^th, EDAC hosted the Electronics Industry Studies Class of the Eisenhower School of the National Defense University. The Eisenhower School runs a graduate degree level program for selected leaders in all branches of the military, plus selected individuals from other agencies and allied nations. The program provides training to these individuals who will be in top leadership positions in the next decade.

Presenters this year included Wally Rhines ( Mentor Graphics), Larry Disenhof ( Cadence), John Harms ( Mentor Graphics), and Yatin Trivedi ( Synopsys). [ More information and photos.]

Meanwhile, as the US and EU introduces new sanctions due to the unfolding situation in the Ukraine, the EDAC Export committee is monitoring these sanctions to determine if there is any effect on the EDA industry. However it’s important to keep informed on these developments directly. The latest updates can be found at www.bis.doc.gov

The EDAC OS roadmap helps EDA vendors and customers to determine which operating systems are best for design starts. The committee is currently planning the annual Operating System Vendor Review, to be held in May. Representatives from OS vendors relavant to EDA, including RedHat, SUSE, and Microsoft, will present the status and plans for OS support. [ Check the latest OS Roadmap.]

Nominations for this year's award are in, and the committee is working to determine who will be honored with the 2014 Phil Kaufman Award. The award presentation will be held in the fall of 2014.

In February, the EDAC-LMA committee conducted a poll regarding interest level in running EDA software in the cloud. A survey was sent to representatives from the 50 EDA customer companies in the Central Enterprise Licensing User Group (CELUG). A key question was, "What is your level of interest in using cloud computing to run your EDA software (1 = None; 10 = Urgently need)." None of the respondents expressed an interest level above 2. Bottom line is there does not yet appear to be a groundswell of demand for enterprise-level EDA software running in cloud instances. [ More information and details].

The MSS report for Q4, 2013 was released in April, showing another quarter of solid growth for the EDA industry. Overall industry revenue was up 5.7% compared to Q4, 2012, on the stregnth of record revenue for both Q4 and calendar 2013. [ Press release.] Highlights of the Q4 report, along with highlights of the previous 4 quarters, are available on the EDAC web site MSS page. The full report is available to representatives from member companies.

Registration is open for the 51st Design Automation Conference (DAC) to be held on June 1 through 5 in San Francisco, CA. This year, DAC is adding a new Automotive Track, bringing together researchers and practitioners from the automotive domain with their counterparts from the embedded systems & software (ESS) and electronic design automation (EDA) domains.

For the convenience of attendees in Silicon Valley, DAC will once again be running shuttle busses from San Jose. Busses will leave and return to the SEMI building (also home to the EDAC office) at 3081 Zanker Rd., San Jose.