Why does it cost 10-100's millions of dollars to design/verify/create? Could we not automate this process somehow based on code?

@jtguibas I think since the ASICs are so specific, you need a whole team of engineers to design and verify these chips. Then, you need to manufacture these chips, which is an extremely expensive process, especially if there are lots of specialized components. This is why you need to make sure the chips will get enough usage to offset the costs of development/production.

@jtguibas There are ways to design ASICs at a high level (HLS) but usually those methods don't produce designs nearly as good as ones that are designed in a HDL like verilog, which then requires large teams to design/verify. With common tasks like video encoding or DSP, especially on a mobile device, small optimizations go a long way.