Spatial Technologies, the CAD engine developer that is owned by Dassault, has been floundering for years.
The word on the street is that Spatial is going into “maintenance mode” and there won’t be many enhancements to the ACIS 3D library.
Providing CAD via hosted services is the dream of many folks that have to use models for their work… An interesting article in Develop3D describes how AutoDesk and the other leading CAD vendors are gearing up efforts to deliver CAD functionality via software as a service.
I believe that the move towards hosted CAD is inevitable and it’s primarily a matter of network bandwidth. Web-based capability to view and manipulate 3D models will become the linchpin for adoption of the model-based enterprise.
We know that organizations such as Aberdeen and CIMData run all sort of scientific surveys about CAD tools. However, we couldn’t resist sharing our qualitative review of the four most prevalent CAD packages in use in the automotive and aerospace industries. This ranking is based on two roughly-defined criteria:
A. First-hand impressions using the actual CAD software ourselves
B. Comments and insights provided by users in approximately 30 different companies
The conclusion for our ranking:
1) NX (V5)
2) Solidworks (2008)
3) CATIA (V5)
4) Pro/E (WF3)
Siemens purchased a software company from UGS that provides a nice balance of providing a robust user interface, supporting complex modeling, and even supporting customers. It’s interesting to note the amount of disdain that users have for CATIA and their licensing. At the same time, there are many SolidWorks zealots. Naturally, SolidWorks has the benefit of being the “youngest” package and thus leverages the lessons learned from all of its brethren.
For those of you tracking the SpaceClaim “direct modeling” CAD tool, the Novedge site has an interesting first-hand review.
We like the notion of SpaceClaim — namely, give engineers other than just the designer access to the model during the early design stages. However, it’s interesting to see if the complexity of the tool is accessible to the broad ranks of engineers.
The standard for 3D CAD, ANSI 14.41, has been released for more than five years. However, the major CAD vendors appear to be implementing it in bits and pieces. For example, Pro/E captures annotation in both 3D and 2D mode, but it doesn’t allow a user in 3D to understand and use the annotations created in 2D.
It would appear that one of the unspoken challenges to the adoption of the model-based enterprise is the fact that so many people do not really understand GD&T. Thus, when you combine a 3D view of a part with all sorts of feature control frames, for many users it ends up looking like a painting from Salvador Dali.
You may have noticed that SpaceClaim, a relative newcomer to the direct CAD modeling world, has raised additional capital to continue their product development. According to MCADCafe, SpaceClaim raised $7 million from their existing venture capital investors.
I know that the posting title looks a little oblique, but the ANSI standard for Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing (Y14.5) will have a 2009 revision next month. For those of you not aware, GD&T is central to engineering design. The new revision will address issues such as:
We get the opportunity to work with just about all of the latest CAD software: CATIA, NX, Pro/E, SolidWorks… each has its own idiosyncracies and most of them take days if not weeks to learn before you become productive. The video below provides a nice short overview of someone using CATIA to create a3D CAD model:
This diagram is a little dated, but it’s a nice picture that illustrates the positioning of the major CAD and PDM packages from Siemens, PTC, Dassault, etc.
A recent quality report by the ASQ (American Society for Quality) confirmed that times are tough but may not be as bleak as they appear upon first glance for certain companies. It states that:
On the one hand are those going into crisis mode, cutting back and de-emphasizing quality initiatives. On the other hand are those that continue to invest in quality and innovation as a competitive advantage even in the face of economic uncertainty.
Additionally, it confirms that the forward-thinking companies are
redoubling certain quality efforts, placing stronger emphasis on preventive actions, increasing commitment to continuous improvement in order to gain competitive advantage, and gaining a clearer quality focus.
The full report is available here – http://www.asq.org/quality-report/reports/quarterly-quality-report-200901.pdf.