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According to a recent talk by Frank Schirrmeister, group director of product marketing for the Cadence System and Software Realization Group, the answer is "yes." System modeling is a level of abstraction that's independent from hardware and software implementation. But there are some interesting questions -- who will do this modeling, who will build the models, and how can the EDA industry contribute?

Schirrmeister spoke at the Electronic Design Processes Symposium (EDPS) April 5, 2012 in Monterey, California. His talk was titled "System-Level EDA 2015: Whose Problem is Software Anyway?" He started his talk with a big number: $2.74 trillion. That's what the electronic systems market is expected to grow to in 2016. This includes a $517 billion semiconductor market and a $2.1B semiconductor IP market - and a great deal of software.

So whose problem is software? Both hardware and software roles have shifted over the past decade. Software development providers have played a big role in platforms such as Texas Instruments OMAP. Apple acquired a semiconductor design capability, and Google recently bought Motorola Mobility. "Who's doing software in the stack has changed significantly over the years," Schirrmeister observed.

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