Hi,
ocean control of spectre from CIW offer the design() command with lib/cell/view arguments. Very nice as the function finds out if the schematic has been checked and saved and netlists again. If I start an ocean-script from CIW it locks up the GUI until the ocean file has finished running. Is there any possibility to background this process. I could also do an ipc* session and start ocean in a sub-process from the beginning on, but then I fear that I cannot use the design() command in lib/cell/view mode.

The skipcref does not seem to cover running cadence tools in the background.

Probably late to help you out. But I remember a sourcelink solution on starting an icfb session in the -nograph mode which allows you to create a netlist like you were talking about ....  
Essentially, you then divide your problem into two parts - 1. create a netlist  2. run a simulation . You don't have to worry about blocking or noblocking mode. The solution # is 11053238 . You could search for it there. I've copied and pasted the script that they gave on how to create the netlist. You could possibly do an ocean run in the script after this...

Code:

#! /usr/bin/csh
icms -nograph -log ./icms.log <</
envSetVal("asimenv.startup" "projectDir" 'string "./simulation")
simulator('spectre)
design("my_design" "test" "schematic")
createNetlist()
exit()
/
exit 1