Pyxis Technology Names Mitch Heins as Vice President of Business Development

Heins brings knowledge of design, EDA and manufacturing to DFM startup

Santa Clara, Calif., February 3, 2006 -- Pyxis Technology, which recently announced plans for DFM-aware routing software, today named Mitchell D. Heins, an executive with experience in design, electronic design automation (EDA) and design for manufacturing (DFM), as vice president of business development. Heins will be reporting to CEO Naeem Zafar from the company’s Austin office.

Enabling designers to trade off between design and manufacturing constraints is a key focus for Pyxis, which is working on design creation products that have DFM in mind from the start. Heins’ responsibilities include building strategic relationships across the multiple disciplines involved in DFM and managing programs with early development partners, foundries, EDA & DFM companies.

"EDA needs a new breed of executive, with knowledge of both fab and process," said Pyxis CEO Naeem Zafar. "Mitch’s years of experience in design, EDA and IC manufacturing process are hard to come by in a single person. That experience coupled with his vision, enthusiasm and energy will serve Pyxis well as we get ready to change the EDA landscape."

Prior to joining Pyxis, Heins was senior director of silicon operations and products for HPL Technologies, Inc., where he was responsible for all business activities of HPL’s test chip division, including product development, marketing, and sales support. Before joining HPL, Heins served as director of applications support and services for Petersen Advanced Lithography. He has also held positions as vice president of strategic third party alliances for Cadence Design Systems and director of ASIC business development for Ambit Design Systems.

At the CAD Framework Initiative, Inc., a consortium focused on software standards for plug-and-play EDA tools (now called the Si2, the Silicon Integration Initiative), Heins held the position of director of marketing. From 1983 to 1995, he worked in various positions at Texas Instruments, ending his tenure as EDA strategy and business development manager.

"I believe the industry is at a natural inflection point, much like it was in the late 80s when we saw the advent of logic synthesis, that will totally change how we do design. Pyxis’ founders have the right mindset and have come up with new ideas and architectures that I believe will change the way physical design is done for the next decade," said Mitch Heins. "I am extremely excited to be working with a company that will help lead the way into the new nanometer era of EDA."

About Pyxis
Pyxis Technology is developing software that addresses the problems chip designers and foundries face in the physical design, layout, and routing of nanometer-scale integrated circuits (ICs) and systems on a chip (SoCs). Pyxis was founded in 2004 by three industry veterans with extensive experience in semiconductor IC design and EDA software development. The company has raised Series A funding from Austin Ventures and CMEA Ventures. For more information, see www.pyxistech.com.