Multiplier Energy Reduction by Dynamic Voltage Variation

Design of portable battery operated multimedia devices requires energy-efficient multiplication circuits. This paper proposes a novel architectural technique to reduce power consumption of digital multipliers. Unlike related approaches which focus on multiplier transition activity reduction, we concentrate on dynamic reduction of supply voltage. Two implementation schemes capable of dynamically adjusting a double voltage supply to input data variation are presented. Simulations show that using these schemes we can reduce energy consumption of 16 × 16-bit multiplier by 34% and 29% on peak and by 10% and 7% on average with area overhead of 15% and 4%, respectively, while maintaining the performance of traditional multiplier.