• Floorplanning: Floorplanning involves partitioning the chip's area into different regions for various functional blocks, memory, and other components. The arrangement of these blocks can impact factors such as signal routing, power distribution, and heat dissipation.
• Placement: Placement involves determining the exact positions of the individual cells (gates) on the chip. The goal is to minimize the total wire length, which reduces signal delay, and to optimize for other metrics like area and power. Placement tools use various algorithms to achieve these objectives.
• Global Routing: Global routing involves creating a high-level routing plan that defines the paths for connecting the various nets (connections between cells). It considers the connectivity between different regions and avoids congestion.
• Detailed Routing: Detailed routing focuses on the individual metal layers and involves determining the exact paths and widths of the metal traces that connect the pins of different cells. It ensures that the connections are correctly made without violating design rules or causing signal integrity issues.
• Clock Tree Synthesis: Clock tree synthesis is the process of designing and implementing a well-balanced clock distribution network to ensure synchronized and reliable clock signals throughout the chip. It aims to minimize clock skew and power consumption.
• Power Distribution Network: The power distribution network involves designing the power grid to deliver a stable and uniform power supply to all parts of the chip. This helps prevent voltage drops and ensures that all components receive sufficient power.
• Design Rule Checking (DRC) and Layout Versus Schematic (LVS) Verification: DRC ensures that the physical layout adheres to the manufacturing rules and constraints specified by the semiconductor foundry. LVS verifies that the physical layout matches the intended logical design.
• Extraction and Timing Analysis: Extraction involves generating an accurate model of the chip's parasitic elements (such as resistance and capacitance) to perform timing analysis. Timing analysis ensures that the design meets performance requirements and identifies potential timing violations.
• Physical Verification: This step involves comprehensive checks to ensure that the layout is manufacturable and free from errors. It includes checks for design rule violations, spacing violations, antenna effects, and more.
• Tapeout: After completing all design and verification steps, the final design data is prepared for manufacturing. This data is sent to the semiconductor fabrication facility (foundry) for chip production.

Physical design is a complex and iterative process that requires a deep understanding of semiconductor manufacturing processes, design rules, and optimization techniques. It plays a critical role in determining the performance, power efficiency, and manufacturability of VLSI chips.