Esterel Technologies and AbsInt form Breakthrough Technology Partnership to Integrate Esterel SCADE Mission and Safety-Critical Embedded Software Development Environment with AbsInt Timing and Stack Usage Analysis Tools

Absint and Esterel Technologies Partnership

Integration between AbsInt’s aiT and StackAnalyzer Tools and the Esterel SCADE Certified Software Factory Offers the First Embedded Software Development Environment to Provide Worst Case Execution Timing (WCET) and Stack Usage Analysis at the Model Level

Elancourt, France and Saarbruecken, Germany — January 31, 2008

Esterel Technologies, the leading worldwide provider of model-based solutions for the development of mission and safety-critical systems and AbsInt, the leading worldwide provider of timing and stack usage analysis solutions announced today their partnership to offer a uniquely integrated environment for developing mission and safety-critical embedded software applications, featuring a seamless workflow between Esterel SCADE and AbsInt’s aiT and StackAnalyzer products.

Esterel SCADE provides a full suite of Model-Based Design (MBD) tools from formal graphical design capture and validation down to embedded C code generation for mission and safety-critical production use. Esterel SCADE is the only MBD solution to offer DO-178B qualified C code generation up to level A, certified IEC 61508 C code generation up to SIL 3 and certified EN 50128 C code generation up to SIL 4.

AbsInt’s aiT and StackAnalyzer products provide a unique capability of assessing worst-case execution time and stack usage of embedded system code, fully taking into account the characteristics of the various hardware platforms.

The coupling of Esterel SCADE with AbsInt’s aiT and StackAnalyzer products provides optimal visibility into the run-time performance of the system by reporting the WCET and stack usage of each design element, at the model level. By raising the level of abstraction with these breakthrough analysis capabilities, embedded software developers can quickly identify and eliminate potential design flaws. In fact, without having written a single line of code, developers can determine which part of the design may contribute most to WCET or stack usage and refactor the design accordingly, saving considerable development cycle time and optimizing the performance of the application right from the model level. Furthermore, Esterel SCADE includes customizable report generation and "diff" capabilities that allow, at the click of a button, an application developer to assess the performance impact of code generation and compilation options on each and every design element.

Although available for review now, the integrated solution will be delivered within SCADE Suite 6.1, scheduled in Q3/2008. Esterel Technologies and AbsInt have cooperated on the partnership and integration in the framework of the INTEREST FP6 European R&D project.

Our partnership with Esterel Technologies provides a breakthrough in how timing validation tools for real-time embedded systems are going to be deployed worldwide, said Christian Ferdinand, AbsInt’s CEO. Now customers will be able to get their safety-critical products validated according to timing and stack usage constraints much more easily and in a fraction of the time taken today using manual methods.

Our partnership with AbsInt helps solve the problems of time and expense associated with validating the real-time characteristics of embedded system development, said Eric Bantegnie, President and CEO of Esterel Technologies. Being able to automate the import of WCET and stack usage analysis into Esterel SCADE’s software development and qualified code generation environment improves communication across the development team, shortens the design, implementation, and code qualification, and ultimately results in highly efficient deployed code.

About aiT and StackAnalyzer

aiT WCET Analyzer computes tight bounds for the WCET of all tasks in an embedded system. aiT is based on statically analyzing a task’s intrinsic cache and pipeline behavior. The results are valid for any input and for any program execution. The precise bounds on the execution time enable better system utilization without compromising safety. StackAnalyzer automatically calculates the worst-case stack usage of the tasks in a program. Stack memory has to be allocated statically by the programmer. Underestimating stack usage can lead to serious runtime errors which can be difficult to find. Overestimating stack usage means a waste of memory resources. Stackanalyzer provides automatic tool support to calculate the stack usage of your application.

StackAnalyzer automatically calculates the worst-case stack usage of the tasks in a program. Stack memory has to be allocated statically by the programmer. Underestimating stack usage can lead to serious runtime errors which can be difficult to find. Overestimating stack usage means a waste of memory resources. Stackanalyzer provides automatic tool support to calculate the stack usage of your application.

About Esterel SCADE

Esterel SCADE, a design environment for safety-critical embedded software applications, provides graphical specification capture and simulation, along with the capability to check safety properties at the model level. It includes SCADE Suite® and SCADE Display™.

SCADE Suite® is the market leading, model-based development environment dedicated to safety-critical embedded software:

DO-178B qualified up to level A for Military and Aerospace Industries
IEC 61508 certified at SIL 3 by TÜV for Heavy Equipment, and Energy
EN 50128 certified at SIL 4 by TÜV for Rail Transportation

SCADE Display™ is the leading edge embedded graphics design environment dedicated to safety-critical display systems, DO-178B qualified up to level A for Military and Aerospace Industries.

About AbsInt

AbsInt AbsInt Angewandte Informatik GmbH provides advanced development tools for embedded systems, and tools for validation and verification of safety-critical software. AbsInt’s customers are companies from the automotive, avionics and telecommunication sectors.

About Esterel Technologies

Esterel Technologies is the worldwide leader of model-based design, verification and code generation tools for critical embedded systems. Esterel Technologies is a privately held company with headquarters in Elancourt, France and Mountain View, California, USA, and with direct sales offices in Germany, the United Kingdom, and China.

For additional information, visit the Esterel Technologies websites at www.esterel-technologies.com and www-esterel-eda.com

Press Contacts

For Esterel Technologies:

Gundel Hahn

Phone : +49 (0) 89 123 922 04

Email : Gundel.Hahn@esterel-technologies.com

For Absint:

Bärbel Franzen

Phone : +49 (0) 681 3836014

Email : franzen@absint.com

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