Briefings: April 2006

By DE Editors

OriginLab Launches Viewer for Graphing/Analysis

OriginLab Corporation, which develops scientific graphing and data analysis tools, has created the Origin Viewer, a free downloadable Windows application that enables non-Origin users to access the content of Origin project files (OPJs). Origin users have found OPJ useful as it provides a flexible way to organize and store related data in a single file. Now, analysts and researchers who use Origin can share their OPJ files with colleagues who do not. Collaborators need only download the free Origin Viewer to access OPJ content.

Within an OPJ file, worksheets, matrices, graphs, presentation layouts, results, and notes can be hierarchically organized into multiple levels of folders. The Origin Viewer provides access to this content using an intuitive Explorer-like interface. As a result, the folder structure is arranged in a navigation tree on the left of the viewer.

Creators of Origin files have the ability to hide certain windows for specific collaborators or can allow those they send a file to see all associated folders and windows. The Viewer gives anyone the ability to copy data, graphs, and notes. Graphs can be copied and pasted as e-mail files.

Origin Viewer can run without installation, thus allowing it to be used on more restricted machines. Further, its small size means it can be attached to an e-mail message.

Instrument manufacturers whose software outputs data files can now choose to have their instrument software save data using the Origin OPJ format. They can simply use the same application support files that come with the Origin Viewer in their own software. By providing the ability to read or write OPJ files that contain their instrument data and any associated meta data, their customers benefit by getting a greater measure of organization and versatility.

The company’s main product line consists of Origin 7.5 and OriginPro 7.5, both of which are available in English, German, and Japanese versions. Since its debut in 1991, OriginLab has sold more than 100,000 copies of Origin. Origin Viewer can read files created with any version of the writing software.

OriginLab Corp.
Northampton, MA

Pro/Engineer Wildfire 3.0 Out

Pro/Engineer Wildfire 3.0 has arrived. A major release of PTC’s MCAD/CAM/CAE workhorse, Wildfire 3.0 targets improving engineering and process productivity

Wildfire 3.0’s Fast Sketcher reduces the number of menu picks required to use and exit the sketch environment. This is said to improve performance with large sketches up to 80%. Assembly workflows have been optimized—up to 5X faster than before.

Wildfire 3.0’s Fast Drawings let you add shaded views to traditional 2D drawing. This helps clarify design concepts faster, removing ambiguity. Improvements in the drawing environment are said to yield an increase in productivity benefits up to 63%.

Fast Sheet Metal gives you the capability to interpret design intent, which in turn, enables you to create sheet-metal features up to 90% faster than before while also reducing the number of features by up to 90%. The complement, Fast CAM enhances the manufacturing interface and speeds the creation of manufacturing geometry by up to 3X.

Wildfire 3.0’s Smart process productivity features include a new customizable Process Wizard that empowers companies to capture expert knowledge and leverage best practices and recommended approaches for different processes. Its Smart Model ability lets you embed manufacturing process data into models, facilitating design for manufacturability while promoting best practices.

Wildfire 3.0 introduces Smart Sharing. These are portable workspaces that track all changed, new, and unchanged files, facilitating offline access to MCAD data and improving collaboration with third parties. It also offers Smart Interoperability with PTC’s Windchill and Pro/Intralink, providing a streamlined process for accessing information. For example, this means that you can automate the reporting of bulk items. There’s also a new status column in the model tree to report the database status of an item.

Pro/Engineer Wildfire 3.0 now also supports for Windows XP 64-bit systems. Active Pro/Engineer users will automatically receive 3.0  free of charge under their current maintenance coverage. For details, go to ptc.com.

PTC
Needham, MA

DE Readers Pick Mathcad 13 as 2005 Product of the Year

Your votes are in and Mathcad 13 from Mathsoft is the 2005 DE Readers’ Choice Product of the Year 2005. Well done Mathsoft, well done.

With Mathcad 13, engineers can document and capture their calculations, analyses, and engineering-critical values as they create them. It has a user-friendly interface that eschews cryptic interfaces deployed by spreadsheets and proprietary programming languages, which saves custom application development time and effort.

DE’s editors thank all the readers who took the time to vote and congratulate the staffs at all our monthly Readers’ Choice winners. Look for a more complete write-up online under News and in your May issue of DE. —Lockwood

Mathsoft
Cambridge, MA

Moldflow Communicator 1.0 Joins Parts of Distributed Injection-Molding Teams

Moldflow Corp. recently announced the immediate availability of Moldflow Communicator 1.0, a new free digital communications tool that lets you share your Moldflow Plastics Insight (MPI) analysis results throughout your product team and supply chain.

Moldflow Communicator lets recipients visualize, quantify, and compare MPI analysis results regardless of their experience levels and without requiring they have access to MPI.

Moldflow Communicator 1.0 supports virtually any result generated with MPI, including x,y plots; shaded, contour, scalar, vector and tensor plots; iso-surfaces; displacement plots; and animations. All that you require is MPI 6.0 Revision 1 or higher to export .MFR files that can be read by Moldflow Communicator.

With Moldflow Communicator, you can share both data and the assumptions behind your data. Extended team members use Moldflow Communicator to view results dynamically and interactively on 3D models. To better understand design improvements, users can wield a set of tools to compare analysis results “side-by-side” from two iterations. Dynamic and incremental pan/zoom/rotate functions, standard view orientations, select saved view bookmarks, cutting planes, and similar features are some of Moldflow Communicator’s visualization capabilities.

Moldflow Communicator gives you the ability to set analysis criteria, which helps you maintain the quality of analyses and better convey design intent. Further, results visualization helps your distributed team—say, moldmakers, manufacturing plants, and engineers—better understand and account for the assumptions, quality, and applicability of your analyses. Moldflow Communicator comes with a tutorial and online help to help non-MPI users get up and running quickly.

Moldflow Communicator 1.0 is free to both Moldflow users and non-users. Future versions of Moldflow Communicator will extend the support to embrace results from other Moldflow products, including Moldflow Plastics Advisers.

Moldflow Communicator 1.0 runs on 32- and 64-bit hardware running Windows. For detailed system specifications, click here.  For a free download, click here. visit

Moldflow Corp.
Framingham, MA

ANSYS to Acquire Fluent

ANSYS has agreed to acquire Fluent, Inc. for 6,000,000 shares of common stock plus approximately $300 million in net cash.

Fluent Inc., supplier of CAE simulation software technologies and services, is known for its CFD (computational fluid dynamics) principles and techniques for simulating fluid flow, heat and mass transfer, and related phenomena involving turbulent, reacting, and multiphase flow. CFD simulation technology is used in almost every industry sector and is experiencing an annual growth rate of 18 percent, according to marketing research firm Daratech, Inc.

The acquisition of Fluent should enhance the breadth, functionality, usability, and interoperability of the ANSYS portfolio of simulation solutions. The combination of software products and services is expected to give ANSYS one of the most complete engineering simulation software offerings in the industry. The combined company will employ about 1,350 people.

“The simulation technologies that Fluent adds complement and broaden the existing ANSYS portfolio of simulation solutions, enabling the combined company to deliver the integration, functionality and interoperability required by customers,” said James Cashman, president and CEO of ANSYS.

The transaction is valued at approximately $565 million based on the $44.11 per share closing price of ANSYS common stock on February 15, 2006, and is anticipated to close in the second quarter of 2006.

Fluent is a subsidiary of Aavid Thermal Technologies, Inc., a provider of thermal management solutions for electronics manufacturers. Prior to the closing of the acquisition, the thermal management solutions business will be spun off to the stockholders of Aavid Thermal Technologies, Inc., and ANSYS will acquire Fluent and the remaining holding companies.

Aavid Thermal Technologies, Inc
Concord, NH

ANSYS
Canonsburg, PA

Fluent, Inc.
Lebanon, NH