Reverse Engineering

Reverse Engineering is the art of extracting, examining, and understanding circuits to reproduce a design. Reverse Engineering can be used in efforts to enhance products, fix bugs, or replicate obsolescent devices.

Traditionally, Tekmos has used datasheets or measured the performance of a customer reference part for our reverse engineering efforts, but over the last few years we have adopted the practice of Imaging. Imaging uses a scanning electron microscope to re-image individual layers of a device. The Imaging software then converts those layers into outputs such as, spice, Verilog or GDSII. These outputs are then simulated, verified and eventually turned into an ASIC.

Metal 1 ( orange) Metal 2 (Pink) Poly (green)

Whether Tekmos chooses the traditional course with datasheets and reference devices or the modern imaging software, we will always perform a patent expiration search or seek approval from the original device manufacture before beginning our reverse engineering efforts.

Diffusion (darker areas) and Poly (thin white lines)

Tekmos has worked with various vendors and software that specialize in reverse engineering to provide a cost-effective turnkey solution for legacy products.