ChipMEM: Verification-Grounded Memory for EDA Agents

Abstract

Large language model (LLM)-based agents use Electronic Design Automation (EDA) tools to generate and revise register-transfer-level (RTL) designs under synthesis and verification feedback. Recent methods learn from this feedback by distilling reusable skills from execution traces or by training on rewards derived from EDA-tools. Both methods are typically evaluated on the tasks that produced the experience. Repeated access to benchmark feedback on the same task can reward task-specific revision rather than creating reusable knowledge that transfers. We introduce ChipMEM, a verification-grounded memory layer for EDA agents. It combines cross-task procedural memory with within-trajectory statistical guidance. Its procedural component distills and stores a skill only after it passes synthesis, simulation, or formal checks, rather than relying on model self-assessments. A Bayesian component maintains hierarchical Beta estimates over tool-call outcomes and ranks recovery strategies that succeeded under comparable errors. A common adapter applies the same memory interface to RTL optimization and testbench-generation agents while preserving each domain's tools and acceptance criteria. We measure performance on training tasks and evaluate whether learned skills transfer to unseen tasks. On RTLRewriter-Bench, under matched model and tool settings, ChipMEM produces equivalence-passing outputs on 39/54 scored designs versus 35/54 without memory; on the 49-design short suite, mean area improvement is 8.69% versus 5.66%. On held-out CVDP tasks, ChipMEM with a frozen procedural library achieves 20/20 accepted outcomes versus 18/20 without memory in a single evaluation per setting.