Contract FPGA Hardware Design Services
Close-Haul Circuits, LLC specializes in the design and development of digital signal processing (DSP) hardware systems. We are experts in Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) design in VHDL and Verilog using both Xilinx and Altera Devices, as well as in the integration of FPGA functional modules with embedded microprocessors.
Why FPGAs?
An FPGA coupled with a general purpose processor (GPP) such as a PowerPC or an Intel Atom is a cost-effective, powerful, and flexible architecture for signal processing systems, ideal for rapid prototyping and R&D applications. Reconfigurable FPGAs have become commodities-- there is no longer a cost advantage to more restrictive and less capable CPLD/DSP-based systems. Due to their pipelined nature, signal processing algorithms lend themselves to hardware acceleration--parallel implementations in FPGAs-- enabling near-real time or real-time on-board processing not attainable using GPPs without the enormous expense of designing, fabricating, and testing an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC). As an added bonus, reconfigurable FPGAs are field-upgradable.
Services
Close-Haul Circuits has more than a decade of experience in all phases of the hardware development process. Click here for Robin Coxe's LinkedIn profile. Core competencies include:
- FPGA Hardware System Concept Development
- DSP Algorithm Design and System Engineering (requirements development and flow down, parametric analysis, algorithm selection and optimization)
- Technical Proposal Preparation
- FPGA Implementations of DSP Algorithms
- Embedded Linux Application Development
- Hardware System Integration and Test
- Creation of Technical Documentation and Marketing Collateral
- Product Management
- Schematic Capture and PCB Layout
- Bill of Materials (BOM) Management and Parts Procurement
- PCB Fabrication and Assembly
Selected Past Projects
- Technical and project lead for the Malleable Signal Processor (MSP), an on-board, real time multispectral
image processor. The MSP evolved from a U.S. Air Force Phase I SBIR project into a key component of the
Roadrunner On-Board Processing Experiment (ROPE) on the TacSat-2 satellite, which launched in
December 2006.
- System-level and FPGA design for an Automated Test Board for a point-to-point microwave modem.
- Port of a point-to-point microwave modem from an Altera Cyclone III to a Xilinx Virtex-4 FPGA.
- Concept development for an FPGA-based sonar signal processing system.
- Embedded Linux driver and glue logic design for a high-performance image processor implemented in a Xilinx Virtex-4 FPGA with an embedded PowerPC.
- Real-time image classification software development for a hyperspectral image processor.
Contact
Robin Coxe, Ph.D., Managing Director
Close-Haul Circuits, LLC.
P.O. Box 426088
Cambridge, MA 02142 USA
circuits@close-haul.com
+1-617-470-8825 (phone)
+1-617-845-0415 (fax)
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