Efficient final placement based on nets-as-points

Deterministic optimization programs are coming to be considered as viable alternatives for the placement of very large sea-of-gate, gate array and standard cell designs. A nets-as-points placement program has been described which provides competitive results in comparison with non-deterministic placement, and at a fraction of the run time. A new pseudo Steiner tree model for the gate placement about the netpoints, along with a virtual channel snap-to-grid procedure, provides results superior to the original nets-as-points placement program without requiring iterative improvement.