Cadence to acquire French security specialist Secure-IC

News | January 23, 2025

By Peter Clarke

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EDA and IP company Cadence Design Inc. (San Jose, Calif.) has agreed to buy Secure-IC (Rennes, France), an embedded security IP platform provider, for an undisclosed sum of money.

It has not been disclosed whether Secure-IC will continue as a wholly-owned subsidiary or be immediately integrated with Cadence. Secure-IC’s website states: “Secure-IC has joined Cadence, a global leader in electronic design automation, to become the dedicated security entity within Cadence.”

Immaterial

Cadence said that the deal is expected to close in the 1H25, subject to regulatory approvals and other customary closing conditions. However, intriguingly, Cadence also said the acquisition is expected to be immaterial to revenue and earnings this year.

The company argued that Secure-IC’s IP offering is complementary to its own and will support IP licensing across a range from protocol controllers and AI accelerators to supporting customers utilizing various processor architectures. Secure-IC’s tools Securyzr, Laboryzr and Expertyzr will be integrated into Cadence’s product portfolio, the company said.

Cadence added the addition of Secure-IC’s expertise would be especially impactful in the context of chiplet systems.

Secure-IC was spun off from Télécom Paris University in 2010 and since then has grown to achieve billions of IP deployments per quarter with more than 100 customers worldwide.

The customer base includes SK Hynix, Huawei, Winbond, Synaptics, Silicon Labs and Faraday Technology. The company’s security IP is deployed in all sectors of electronics including automotive, datacenter and networking, aerospace and defense, IoT and mobile and consumer electronics.