Voltage and level-shifter assignment driven floorplanning

Low Power Design has become a significant requirement when the CMOS technology entered the nanometer era. Multiple-Supply Voltage (MSV) is a popular and effective method for both dynamic and static power reduction while maintaining performance. Level shifters may cause area and Interconnect Length Overhead (ILO), and should be considered at both floorplanning and post-floorplanning stages. In this paper, we propose a two phases algorithm framework, called VLSAF, to solve voltage and level shifter assignment problem. At floorplanning phase, we use a convex cost network flow algorithm to assign voltage and a minimum cost flow algorithm to handle level-shifter assignment. At post-floorplanning phase, a heuristic method is adopted to redistribute white spaces and calculate the positions and shapes of level shifters. The experimental results show VLSAF is effective.