Virtual platform technology enables the creation of software models that can fully represent the functionality of an embedded system. They combine high-speed processor instruction-set simulators and abstract, transaction-level models (TLM) of the hardware building blocks to create a high-performance software development environment. This promotes continuous, pre-silicon hardware/software integration, instead of waiting to bring hardware and software together near the end of the silicon development.
Virtual platforms improve software development productivity by allowing unlimited observability and controllability of the target hardware, and through predictable and repeatable execution of debug scenarios. Virtual platforms allow developers to boot operating systems, create applications and multimedia codecs and develop low-level drivers.