High-level synthesis – also called behavioral and architectural-level synthesis – is a key design technology to realize systems on chip/package of various kinds, whether single or multi-processors, homogeneous or heterogeneous, for the embedded systems market or not. Actually, as technology progresses and systems become increasingly complex, the use of high-level abstractions and synthesis methods becomes more and more a necessity. Indeed, the productivity of designers increases with the abstraction level, as demonstrated by practices in both the software and hardware domains. The use of high-level models allows designers with systems, rather than circuit, background to be productive, thus matching the trend of industry which is delivering an increasingly larger.
