LONDON — Ultrasoc Technologies Ltd., a startup company formed in 2005, is building chip design and systems development tools for embedded multiprocessor system on chip (MPSOC) design.

Ultrasoc (Colchester, England) offers software tools to perform: embedded software optimization, design support for real-time systems and task execution time analysis. The company is being built on research undertaken by Ultrasoc's chief technology officer Klaus McDonald-Maier and his group while at the University of Kent (Canterbury, England).

That research has now been shaped into a suite of software tools and additional hardware that allows a reduction in development time for embedded software-programmable system chips, compared with conventional design, the company claimed.

As part of its formation Ultrasoc has signed a license agreement with the University of Kent for exclusive access to a portfolio of patents and patent applications based on the work undertaken by Klaus McDonald-Maier and his group while at the department. McDonald-Maier is now a reader in the department of computer science at the University of Essex (Colchester, England) from where he serves as chief technology officer of Ultrasoc.

Included in the portfolio are patent applications on debug support interfaces for ICs, on debug condition detection, and on a "bridging architecture for multichip semiconductor components.

"We are building a debug support strategy for next generation SoCs that are using multicore processors. We are also conducting performance analysis on embedded SoCs and have provided a tool that can optimize code running on embedded platforms — particularly relevant for hard real-time environments," said McDonald-Maier, in a statement.

Ultrasoc is also offering a range of consultancy services in core and chip hardware design, embedded software writing, and systems and module design. The company said it has formed strategic relationships with semiconductor vendors and embedded systems providers, but did not disclose the name of these companies.