As recently reported by TechCrunch, UC Santa Barbara and UC San Diego joint spin-out Tortuga Logic recently announced new financing from Eclipse Ventures.  Justin Butler, Partner at Eclipse Ventures, UCSB Alumnus, and now new board member of Tortuga Logic notes “More than $150 billion is spent a year on software-based cyber security tools. As machines control more of our physical world, security needs to be built in from the ground up and Tortuga Logic offers a proactive and early approach to eliminating security vulnerabilities.”  

Tortuga Logic has deep roots in UC Santa Barbara Computer Science and Computer Engineering.  Founded by UCSB Alumni Dr. Jason Oberg and Dr. Jonathan Valamehr along with UCSB Professor Tim Sherwood and UCSD Professor Ryan Kastner, the company brings a unique set of technologies and capabilities to bear on the problem of identifying and eliminating security vulnerabilities in semiconductor designs.  

Accompanying this new round of funding is the hiring of Andrew Daman as Vice President of Engineering.  “Tortuga Logic’s products fill a gap between the intent of security IP building blocks and their actual deployment in full SoC designs,” remarks Dauman. “Without these products, chips will continue to be built in ways that leave them vulnerable to hackers. Our goal is to ensure the chip’s final implementation does not expose a security hole that software will exploit.”  Before joining Tortuga Logic, Dauman built and directed the engineering group at Synplicity, now part of Synopsys.  In his most recent role, he was Vice President of Engineering at Synopsys, managing the engineering efforts of the HAPS SoC prototyping platforms and Synplify FPGA synthesis products.