Stay up-to-date with the latest news, developments and insights from Lanza techVentures, including groundbreaking news and updates from the innovative companies within our investment portfolio. Explore how our ventures are shaping the future across industries and driving transformative advancements.
Media Contact
Nanette Collins
Public Relations for Lanza techVentures
(617) 437-1822
» Email Nanette
A fireside chat with Dr. Lucio Lanza
Nov 3, 2020
Dr. Ashish Darbari of Axiomise talks to Dr. Lucio Lanza about some of the exciting things Lucio did in his early days in Olivetti, Intel, Daisy Systems, and Cadence to his current engagement in pervasive healthcare.
Go Configure Design Challenge Series
Oct 9, 2017
Lucio Lanza, an advisor to efabless, a marketplace and platform for community-engineered electronics, talks with Silego’s Mike Noonen about the efabless/Silego “Go Configure Design Challenge Series.” The challenge calls the global designer community to implement well-used functions using Silego’s configurable mixed-signal ICs with the efabless platform serving as the crowd source design platform.
DAC 2017 Pavilion: Exploring the Connections Between the Digital World and Physical World
Jun 20, 2017
Arm CEO Simon Segars and Lucio Lanza engage in a far-reaching conversation about the Internet of Things and how the digital world will be connected with the physical world.
Lanza’s Tech Vision Challenge: Daring to Move to Open Source
Jun 6, 2016
DAC 2016 Pavilion Session
What You Call EDA, I Call IP – EDA Past, Present, and Future with Lucio Lanza
Dec 19, 2014
Amelia Dalton, EE Journal
2014 Phil Kaufman Award Video Tribute to Lucio Lanza
Nov 4, 2014
EDAC
2025
The Making of the Ethernet Protocol Standard
EE Times
September 17, 2025
We started wondering if we could take control of the protocol. What about changing the communication protocol? How do we do something that’s not going through communication modems and the PBX?
We decided to establish a communication link, not via modems, but a simple baseband connection between two computers. We felt we should create a communication link simply in baseband.
2024
Looking at the Evolution of the Semiconductor IP Market with Executive Advisor Jeff Lewis
SEMI
August 6, 2024
Smith: At what point did people start to believe IP was a real market and they could trust a vendor?
Lewis: I don’t know if there was an inflection point. More and more people started getting used to the idea that IP was an industry. Arm was probably the major catalyst.
Artisan had two different engagement models. One was the integrated device manufacturer (IDM) model. Mark Templeton, co-founder and CEO of Artisan who died in 2016, and Lucio Lanza, Managing Partner of Lanza techVentures and Artisan’s Chairman, are credited with developing the royalty model and the intellectual property category. They drove it with the IDM model.
Smith: Should Mark Templeton be considered the innovator and creator of the IP industry?
Lewis: I’m not sure there’s anything I can say about him that hasn’t been said already. He was a great guy and an important thinker. I credit him for doing an excellent job crafting a successful company. And, of course, Lucio Lanza was absolutely instrumental as well. He pushed Artisan to do royalties, and Mark helped drive it to fruition.
2023
The Democratization of Chip Design
January 2023
DENA
2022
Weighing Chip-Design-Verification Challenges for MedTech
EETimes
November 23, 2022
The Investment Community’s View of Chip Design Democratization and its Impact on Healthcare
Global Semiconductor Alliance
November 11, 2022
“What in theory was going to be a reduction of investment is an explosion of new investments.”
Rising to the Verification Challenge of Open Source
Tech Design Forum
October 17, 2022
“This market expansion is increasing the size of potential designs. Open-source design tools are becoming available for devices that are less sophisticated than in the past and in many different application.”
The Democratization of Chip Design
by Lucio Lanza, Mike Wishart, and Mohamed Kassem
July 2022
“The open-source silicon movement with a community-based, open-source platform of easy-to-use, easy-to-access tools is a practical and efficient way to ensure innovation and has the potential to drive exponential semiconductor industry growth.”
The Critical Need for Fully Secure Networks for Remote Data Sharing
by Lucio Lanza and David Stewart
May 23, 2022
“While technology enabling remote access is largely available, the security challenges aren’t a high enough priority for healthcare providers against their desire to grab market share. This results in providers who do not appear to be fully aware of the risks facing consumers and consequently their own businesses. Those risks need to be properly and professionally identified and mitigated to effectively implement and access healthcare at the edge.”
The Evolution of Portable Verification
by Lucio Lanza and Dave Kelf
May 3, 2022
“Synthesis can solve many of the issues across modern verification methodologies. It will allow test methods to scale and make full use of the verification platforms available, create a configurable reuse approach to save vast composition effort and provide the quality coverage necessary for integrity requirements.”
The Indispensables: The Diverse Electronic System Design Ecosystem
by Bob Smith
February 15, 2022
“A good example comes from Lucio Lanza, managing partner of Lanza techVentures, an ESD Alliance member, who often describes the move from custom ICs to semi-custom ICs in the 1980s as a game-changer. Despite intense criticism, the move to semi-custom design, a result of the efforts of early electronic design automation (EDA) pioneers Daisy, Mentor and Valid, broadened the range of design tool offerings and engineering expertise. Expanding the design space to include semi-custom ICs produced a new community of engineers who proved they didn’t need to be experts to do chip design. It also produced a new market segment.”
2021
The Democratization of Chip Design
by Mike Wishart and Lucio Lanza
November 24, 2021
“An open development model will push the boundaries and attract innovative designers creating new technologies, something the semiconductor industry is now starting to deeply understand.”
Lanza techVentures Investments – At the Intersection of Semiconductors and Healthcare
by Bob Smith, SEMI
November 16, 2021
“Behavioral trends are moving telehealth forward. The technology is available and the infrastructure is catching up.”
Semiconductors in Healthcare
by Lucio Lanza and Rick Carlson
Semiconductor Digest
August/September Issue, 2021
An Explosion of Design through the Open-Source Silicon Success
by Lucio Lanza
May 4, 2021
“Semiconductor companies doing new design starts should welcome the opportunity to minimize the cost of the design and dependence solely on expert engineers. With the prospect of the number of IC design starts growing by a factor of a thousand, the industry needs to find a way to multiply the number of engineers. Open source may be the answer.”
Roaring ’20s For The Chip Industry
Jan 28, 2021
“If medical applications were a huge growth area for semiconductors in 2020, IoT has all the makings of reordering the industry dynamics in 2021,” says Lucio Lanza, managing director for Lanza techVentures. “We’re seeing it already as project groups designing new systems in package and chips take advantage of open-source environments and low-cost implementation tools. The result is an explosion of new, cheaper chip designs, and far more rapid solutions delivery targeting a host of new applications. The winners may, in turn, become the high-end chip designs of the future.”
2018
Predictions: Markets And Drivers
Jan 11, 2018
The industry is in a rapid growth and learning phase. “As we head into 2018, it’s worth remembering the humble beginnings of three of the most visible companies setting the agenda for the semiconductor industry,” says Lucio Lanza, managing director of Lanza techVentures. “Google was an online search engine, Amazon sold books online, and Facebook started life as an online dating service. Their initial strategic views are nothing like the path they are on today. These technology giants reinvented themselves as they went along and, in their latest incarnation, are maximizing their influence to change society in ways we haven’t begun to imagine.”
Looking forward, Lanza says that reinvention is crucial. “The semiconductor design ecosystem has proven time and again, without an assumption, it could predict the future. And yet it made possible the IoT, creating ubiquitous connectivity and the digital society where physical continuity and dimension are no longer important. The need for hardware components and solutions to support these emerging markets will become obvious in 2018. It’s up to the semiconductor design ecosystem to set a path to respond, as it always has.”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
Machine Learning’s Growing Divide
Jan 11, 2018
Lucio Lanza, managing director for Lanza techVentures, adds that “the main metric to optimize is the ability to keep the processing unit fed, i.e. occupancy. This involves both latency and throughput. With Moore’s Law breaking down, we should expect to see more single-task designed chips and generally a move to single instruction, multiple data (SIMD) and away from multiple instruction, multiple data (MIMD).”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
2017
EDA Challenges Machine Learning
Dec 14, 2017
“Using a cost function based on power or total energy, one can use machine learning trained on existing designs on the current node to optimize new designs on the same node,” asserts Lucio Lanza, managing director of Lanza techVentures. “While, a new node presents different physics constraints and may have a new structure, a new node is developed based on our understanding of older nodes. This means there is information in designs from previous nodes that can guide design in the latest node. Using what is called transfer learning, we can take machine learning models trained on previous nodes and use them as a starting point for building models for the new node. This would mean that one would not need to build new machine learning models from scratch for each node. They can start from a position of experience and this can be transferred.”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
An Innovator’s Vision
Aug 28, 2017
To innovate you have to see patterns from the past and project them into the future. Lucio Lanza talks about a likely pattern for the future.
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
Is Design Innovation Slowing?
Aug 10, 2017
“Today, it has moved from applications to things that can impact society,” said Lucio Lanza, managing director of Lanza techVentures. “We are in the middle of this change right now. For example, the new generation does not care about spending time walking around a mall. It’s a waste of time. They don’t need to meet people in the shopping mall. They can meet them on Facebook.”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
AI-powered Drug Discovery Captures Pharma Interest
Jul 12, 2017
Eric Smalley, Nature Biotechnology
IoT Myth Busting
Jul 13, 2017
“Lucio Lanza, managing partner at Lanza techVentures, is in total agreement. ‘The design automation segment of the industry needs to be alert and in front of the pack. IoT design is unique because it is not driven by the next node, and we’ll need to understand the driving factors to be able to support the evolving needs of IoT. And now that we know the next segment of design challenges may not be just the increase in complexity of SoC, we need to become strategically alert. It may be the optimization of silicon-on-package or IP-on-substrate driven by power or the ability to make memories connect in a more effective way, or FPGAs become the foundation of inexpensive innovative ideas or…who knows what?'”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
When Digital, Physical Worlds Merge
Jul 6, 2017
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
Takeda Explores Potential of AI Drug Discovery Model
Jul/Aug 2017 Issue
On page 10, Numerate’s CEO Guido Lanza provides details on the Takeda deal and what it could mean for both companies.
Pharmafocus
When Your Sweat Knows More about You…
Apr 10, 2017
Junko Yoshida, EBN
My Breakfast with Lucio
Mar 29, 2017
“…we met in the very comfortable environment of Il Fornaio in Palo Alto. Even for breakfast, Lucio invites you to an Italian restaurant because…well, how else will you get good coffee in a country that is not Italy?”
Paul McLellan, Cadence Breakfast Bytes
How Lucio Went from Italy to EDA via Intel
Mar 28, 2017
“Lucio had a true gift for anticipating the products and technologies that would soon be needed by our customers. Sometimes his insights were controversial but his predictions were always right on,” stated Joe Costello.
Paul McLellan, Cadence Breakfast Bytes
2017: Tool And Methodology Shifts
Jan 12, 2017
An important part of that vision is making IP more portable. “The semiconductor ecosystem and its customers will have a new resource in 2017 with the emergence of an online marketplace that connects demand with a global community of IC and IP designers,” says Mike Wishart, CEO of efabless.com. “The acute need for customized silicon for smart hardware products will be met by a community of unaffiliated designers on affordable, re-purposed 180nm nodes with libraries of proprietary and open-source processors and on-demand analog and mixed signal IP.”
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
2016
Reflecting Back On 2016
Dec 22, 2016
Lucio Lanza, managing director for Lanza techVentures, reminded us that “the EDA tagline ‘Where Electronics Begins’ is no exaggeration.” He reminded us about how important innovation is within EDA.
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
Rethinking the Sensor
Jul 7, 2016
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
Looking Beyond Technology
Jun 30, 2016
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
Uncertainty Rocks Chip Market
Jun 30, 2016
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
Will Open-Source Work For Chips?
Jun 30, 2016
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
DAC News, Monday: Lucio Lanza Panel on Open Source
Jun 7, 2016
Paul McLellan, Cadence Breakfast Bytes
Pivot Is The New Watchword For Design Automation
Jun 3, 2016
Lucio Lanza
Lucio Lanza Joins Electronic System Design Alliance Board of Directors
Apr 13, 2016
Electronic System Design Alliance
Predictions For 2016: Tools and Flows
Jan 28, 2016
Brian Bailey, Semiconductor Engineering
Time For Change
Jan 28, 2016
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
2015
The Future Of Moore’s Law
Part 1 – Jun 29, 2015
Part 2 – Jul 22, 2015
Part 3 – Aug 3, 2015
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
An Interview with Kaufman Award Winner Dr. Lucio Lanza
Jan 15, 2015
Bill Wong, Electronic Design
2014
Lucio on EDA Investment
Dec 22, 2014
Bryon Moyer, EE Journal
Kaufman Dinner: Philosophy Redefined
Nov 6, 2014
Peggy Aycinena, EDACafe
Lucio and the Kaufman Award
Nov 6, 2014
Paul McLellan, Semiwiki
Executive Insight: Lucio Lanza
Oct 30, 2014
Ed Sperling, Semiconductor Engineering
Lucio Lanza to Receive EDA Honor
Oct 27, 2014
R. Colin Johnson, EE Times
How Lucio Lanza Got Into EDA
Oct 21, 2014
Paul McLellan, Semiwiki
Leonardo, Michelangelo, Lucio: A taxonomy of Italian Genius
Oct 16, 2014
Peggy Aycinena, EDACafe
Mark Templeton Inducted into Phil Kaufman Hall of Fame by the ESD Alliance and IEEE CEDA
Oct 3, 2022
Lanza techLanza techVentures Names Rick Carlson Investment Partner
Dec 16, 2021
Lanza techVentures Becomes Member of SEMI ESD Alliance
Aug 26, 2021
Lanza techVentures Joins Global Semiconductor Alliance
Aug 17, 2021
Lanza techVentures Portfolio Company Altia Systems Signs Agreement to be Acquired by GN Audio
Feb 28, 2019
Approov Raises $6.7 Million for Mobile App Security
RSAC 2025: Approov Has Some Ideas for Cleaning Up Mobile App ‘Cesspool’
Cybersecurity leaders feted at annual awards ceremony in Edinburgh
Approov Limited Named Finalist in FinTech Scotland Awards 2024
An Industry-Developed Approach to Thwart Software Piracy
ESD Alliance And SEMI Efforts To Combat Design Automation Software Piracy
OpenAI, Microsoft Disrupt Nation-State Actors’ Malicious Use of AI
Hackers are coming for your travel accounts: Here’s how to protect yourself
Approov Identifies and Addresses Apple Watch Security Issues
How Breker is Helping to Solve the RISC-V Certification Problem
Want Automated, Certification-Level RISC-V Verification Coverage?
Video: The Road to Coverage is Paved with Good Intentions
Qualitative Shift in RISC-V Targets Raises Verification Bar
A Focus on Chiplet Verification
Breker’s Maheen Hamid Believes Shared Vision Unifying Factor for Business Success
AI’s Power to Transform Semiconductor Manufacturing
PDF Solutions’ Monthly Blog: Bringing AI to Scale
ESD Alliance Elects 10-Member Governing Council to 2-Year Term
Optimism Prevailed at CEO Outlook, though Downturn Could Bring Unpredictable Challenges
PDF Solutions to Enhance Battery Analytics Platform with Acquisition of Lantern Machinery Analytics
PDF Solutions® and Voltaiq Announce Collaboration to Support Intelligent Battery Production
Analog Devices Adopts PDF Solutions’ End-to-End Big Data Analytics Solution
This chapter by Lucio Lanza appears in A Short History of Circuits and Systems, 2016. It is an essay on the business of Design Automation that depicts the evolution of this small, but meaningful segment of the Semiconductor Industry and some thoughts on where it may go next.
