|
ALSE was created in 1993 by Bertrand Cuzeau to promote new digital design tools and methodologies, and to introduce Synario (a new tool from Data I/O) in France. At that time, only ASIC designers used Verilog or VHDL synthesis and simulation, while Programmable Logic designers were stuck with primitive tools based on schematics using proprietary libraries, with first generation languages (Abel, Palasm, Cupl...) and with gate-level simulators (at best !).
Synario was a milestone in the industry, bringing affordable HDL synthesis and simulation in an integrated framework, and offering Top-Down design, vendor-independence, portability, HDL simulation, generic schematics, etc... This was the beginning of our “crusade” to help these changes happen in the (French) industry.
At all times, the adoption of new Methodologies is a major challenge, and High Quality Training Courses are the best way to facilitate the transition. It’s therefore no surprise that we developed our own specific Training Course Material (Digital Design Basics, Abel, Verilog, and VHDL). Synario users were the obvious target, but this Training activity quickly spread up with various partnerships (semi-houses, European Programs like Jessica) in France and in Switzerland : engineers loved our Training courses because of their concrete & proven efficiency.
In ‘97, with the turmoil in Design tools and EDA companies, we focused on Services: Design sub-contracting, Consulting and Training courses. The success was immediate and we designed more and more complex systems while the Programmable Logic chips went from a few thousands of gates to the million(s) we use today. We were quite proud to demonstrate de-facto how well the methodologies we did teach worked for us.
Since then, Synario and all its competitors (Viewlogic, Veribest...) disappeared, but the methodologies they introduced are now well established. The Synario nostalgics can still find traces of its brilliant technology in Xilinx’s ISE and Lattice ispLever.
The next logical step occurred at the end of ‘99 when ALSE became the official Doulos UK Partner to delivery the Doulos Training Course in France. Despite the success of ALSE’s modest training course material, the decision was taken to abandon it for the extremely rich and high-end Doulos portfolio. The level of quality and the wide scope of the Doulos portfolio were key factors in the decision (VHDL , VHDL-AMS, Expert VHDL Design, Expert VHDL Verification, Verilog, SystemVerilog, PSL, SystemC, Expert SystemC, Tcl/Tk, etc). The Training courses are updated and improved with the continuous involvement of many engineers. Our collaboration with Doulos is tight and exciting.
In May 2003, ALSE became the Altera Technical Training Partner in France.
We built rapidly a new extensive and simplified portfolio of Training courses for Altera with two major courses : one for Designing with Quartus II (3 days) and the other focused on Altera SOPC Nios II (3 to 5 days).
After the success we experienced in France, Altera asked us to offer these Training courses in other European countries and we currently serve Benelux, UK, Germany, The Netherlands... We built a cross-agreement with Doulos to take advantage of their international presence.
In 2010, after 17 years of continued growth and success, ALSE is now well established and balanced between the following activities :
- Custom Design and Services,
- Developing and selling innovative and High Performance IPs
- Delivering the Doulos Training Courses in France
- Designing and Delivering our Training courses in France and part of Europe (Altera Technology and ALSE courses), but also in the USA and Japan.
- And new: we are preparing a new series of High Performance FPGA boards.
All our Engineers are involved in all the tasks above, and this is certainly contributing to our efficiency and to our credibility.
|
