Statistical static timing analysis via modern optimization lens: I. Histogram-based approach

Abstract: Statistical static timing analysis (SSTA) is studied from the point of view of mathematical optimization. We present two formulations of the problem of finding the critical path delay distribution that were not known before: (i) a formulation of the SSTA problem using Binary--Integer Programming and (ii) a practical formulation using Geometric Programming. For simplicity, we use histogram approximation of the distributions. Scalability of the approaches is studied and possible generalizations are discussed.