Latest News
October 1, 2005
By DE Editors
Industry News, Reports, and Items of Interest
UGS Aims Enterprise-level PLM at mid-sized manufacturersUGS Corp. has announced a new strategy focused on delivering mid-sized manufacturers enterprise-level PLM technology in an easy-to-deploy portfolio. The new UGS Velocity Series strategy comprises a portfolio of design, analysis, and PLM technologies that do not require extensive IT support for deployment and offer a low total cost of ownership.
The UGS Velocity Series contains Solid Edge version 18 as its MCAD design component and Version 9.1 of Femap serves as its FEA (finite element analysis) component. Teamcenter Express is the key to PLM.
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Using its Insight technology, Solid Edge already merges design management capabilities within the MCAD environment. Version 18 builds on this by letting users choose from a range of scalable collaborative PDM (cPDM) solutions. In this portfolio, while Insight continues to provide management capabilities for single-site teams with basic workflow needs, its new embedded client provides seamless and transparent connectivity between Solid Edge and Teamcenter Express technology. This helps with creating multi-CAD, multisite implementations for more advanced workflow needs.
Solid Edge Version 18 introduces two complementary methods to analyze and validate designs much earlier in the design cycle. The first, Femap Express, is built into Solid Edge. It provides preconfigured, best practice, process guidance for accurate analysis of solid and sheet metal parts. Second, Solid Edge integrates further and is associative with Femap for advanced analysis. (For more on Femap 9.1, click here.)
Additionally, Solid Edge 18 can be augmented with a new wire harness design option that uses popular eCAD electrical circuit diagrams to automate wire harness designs. Electrical and mechanical design teams can now collaborate closely to create a complete digital mockup that includes wires, cables, and bundles with manufacturing information easily accessible.
Teamcenter Express manages the complete design process for engineering organizations. It applies preconfigured industry best practices to provide simple installation, setup, ease of use, and support, for a low total cost of ownership. To minimize IT implementation and maintenance costs, the product is designed for the standard process in a Microsoft environment and preconfigured with workflows from UGS’s past cPDM experience.
Teamcenter Express is scalable to the full Teamcenter portfolio as customer needs grow. It is built on a common database architecture promoting data sharing for coordinated release and engineering of order processes, which helps organizations improve the speed, efficiency, and quality of product development from concept on up to manufacturing.
Teamcenter Express also promotes project-wide collaboration through standard electronic data exchange and visualization formats, including popular PDF and JT. Further, it can manage data created by third-party software tools in addition to UGS product data. Teamcenter Express can be coupled with a variety of CAD applications including UGS’s NX as well as CATIA, AutoCAD, Inventor, and SolidWorks. It also integrates with a variety of market-leading ERP solutions for consistent BOM management.
The UGS Velocity Series will be distributed and supported through a new Global Channel Program designed to enhance distribution via comprehensive channel partners.
For more information on the UGS Velocity Series, Teamcenter Express, Solid Edge 18, and Femap, click here.
UGS • Plano, TX • ugs.com
The current process for development involves different tools with their own specific sets of functions and often steep learning curves. That means designers have to develop algorithms that are not easily portable across the industry and must be rewritten for new projects and new technologies, which ultimately drives costs higher.
The founding companies of the Numerical Mathematics Consortium say they established the organization to create a standard specification for numeric mathematics that ensures algorithm portability and reuse across platforms and applications. The organization’s objective is to create a specification that defines core mathematical function definitions applicable to numeric algorithms. These algorithms can then be implemented in a wide variety of application areas such as industrial control, embedded design and scientific research, as well as be easily shared among researchers and developers in industry and academia.
Vendors and individuals interested in taking an active role in standardizing numerical mathematics should visit nmconsortium.org for more information.
Numerical Math Consortium • nmconsortium.org
INRIA • Le Chesnay Cedex, France • inria.fr
Maplesoft • Waterloo, ONT • maplesoft.com
Mathsoft • Cambridge, MA • mathsoft.com
National Instruments • Austin, TX • ni.com
AutoVue version 19 from Cimmetry Systems Corporation adds collaborative visualization support for several key manufacturing formats including Gerber, ODB++, and EDIF. It helps extend AutoVue’s position in collaborative visualization by offering the same capabilities design teams have to high-tech companies using outsourced manufacturing.
New minimum distance measurement tools, improved board entity viewing functionality, and multipage BOM generation capabilities further enhance EDA usability, improving the experience of electronics designers, testers, and contract manufacturers. AutoVue offers users—regardless of their role in the organization or their geographic location—in the industrial, automotive, aerospace and defense, electronics and high tech, and medical device markets the ability to natively view and mark up multiformat document data.
AutoVue V19’s strength lies in its ability to integrate seamlessly with multiple enterprise systems of record to provide secure and reliable collaborative visualization. As manufactured goods become increasingly complex, AutoVue’s new capabilities in 3D exploded view manipulation, assembly comparison, and advanced search can provide process planners, illustrators, shop personnel, and designers with the ability to view and collaborate on product information faster and more efficiently.
Manufacturing information including dimensional constraints, geometric tolerances, process notes and work instructions can also be read from or captured with the model to drive elimination of paper-based processes on the shop floor.
AutoVue’s unique 3D compare functionality goes beyond simple graphical evaluation, enabling users to detect nongraphical file properties at the assembly or part level. Dynamic assembly explosion and advanced search functionality deliver component results quickly and reliably. With AutoVue 19, users at all levels of design expertise have the ability to drill down to critical MCAD design attributes from a single interface.
To learn more about AutoVue 19’s new features and functionality, visit cimmetry.com.
Cimmetry Systems Corp. • Montreal, QUE • cimmetry.com
To illustrate a “Briefings” item in the September 2005 issue entitled, “Record-Time Redesign Helps Lance Win Tour #7,” the editors placed a CD-adapco image of a time trialist on an AMD Opteron chip. An editing error left the impression that STAR-CAD CFD was used by Trek Bicycles. In fact, Trek engineers used CFdesign from Blue Ridge Numerics to redesign the time trial bicycles used by Lance Armstrong and the Discovery Channel team in the 2005 Tour de France.
Blue Ridge Numerics • Charlottesville, VA • cfdesign.com
SmartCAMcnc has announced the completion of version 12.1 releases for SmartCAM Production Milling, Advanced Milling, FreeForm Machining, Production Turning, Advanced Turning, Advanced Wire EDM, and Advanced Fabrication.
These releases include expanded data export capabilities, the added ability to convert geometry to a hidden layer or step, refinement of the Transform Move function to allow the toolpath clear value to automatically follow repositioned toolpath elements, the addition of automated “to world-Ø” (zero) coordinate settings, and enhanced dynamic nesting capability.
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Dynamic Nest allows users to move individual parts or the active group for best fit in the nested file. This functionality also provides discrete movement of parts for non-nesting requirements, a highly requested enhancement to SmartCAM.
SmartCAM computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) software provides multiple-surface capabilities for a full range of parts from 2-axis work to complex 3-axis molds, dies, and prototypes. SmartCAMcnc provides maintenance contracts, updates, upgrades, and technical support for all SmartCAM users, regardless of version.
The next release for SmartCAMcnc is version 12.5 of all seven SmartCAM base applications, which will include enhancements for layers and groups, a new Open GL Dynamic Rendering viewer, and new file exporting capability. All SmartCAM products include updated data translators and market leading NC editing software. For more information, visit smartcamcnc.com.
SmartCAMcnc • Eugene, OR • smartcamcnc.com
Calerga Releases New Versions of All Products
Calerga has released new versions of its products, beginning with Sysquake, its flagship program. Sysquake 3.1 for Windows and Mac OS X is a scientific application with interactive graphics that provide users with a better understanding of problems. The new version now includes support for Web services, design of digital filters, and improvements to its Matlab-compatible language. Sysquake LE 3.1 is a free version of Sysquake, also for Windows and Mac OSX.
Sysquake Remote is an Apache module that lets users easily add scientific computing and graphics to HTML documents in a way similar to PHP. It works with Mac OS X, Solaris, and Linux systems.
LyME brings the power of Sysquake’s programming language to Palm OS devices, and LME for Pocket PC is an experimental port of Sysquake’s language and graphics (without interactivity) for Windows mobile devices.
Sysquake LE, LyME and LME for Pocket PC are free downloads. For more information, visit calerga.com.
Calerga • Lausanne, Switzerland • calerga.com
National Instruments will begin releasing environmentally friendly products as part of the NI Hazardous Substances Reduction initiative. The initiative is a voluntary program modeled after the European Union’s Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive, which restricts the use of harmful substances such as lead, mercury, and cadmium in new equipment.
NI already has RoHS-compliant versions of its GPIB interface chips available and plans to release RoHS-compliant versions of other leading products starting in the first quarter of 2006. With the new products, engineers and scientists can build systems that meet anticipated future environmental requirements.
“NI recognizes that eliminating certain hazardous substances from our products is beneficial not only to the environment but also to NI customers and employees,” said Andy Krupp, NI’s director of quality.
The European Union RoHS directive restricts the use of lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium, polybrominated biphenyls (PBB), and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE) in new electrical and electronic equipment to be sold in the European Union after July 1, 2006. The RoHS directive applies to eight categories of electrical and electronic equipment, but excludes products in a ninth category, monitoring and control instruments, under which NI products fall.
For more information on the NI RoHS initiative and information on specific product plans, visit ni.com/environment.
National Instruments • Austin, TX • ni.com
MSC.Software Corp. announced an alliance partnership with AlphaSTAR Corporation (ASC), a provider of advanced engineering analysis of complex engineering material systems, to provide comprehensive simulation capability of composites, ceramic, and metallic material systems.
“The level of product complexity in today’s leading manufacturing companies is driving the need for virtual product development,” said Frank Kovacs, vice president of strategic alliances for MSC.Software. “Increasingly, today’s product requirements are demanding the use of more advanced material systems such as composites to achieve lighter and stronger products.”
To respond to that trend, MSC will be augmenting the capability of its MSC.Nastran product with ASC’s GENOA program so users can optimize their evaluation of composites, ceramics, and other advanced material systems. Representatives of both companies have said the rapid growth of composites in manufacturing is resulting in a need for accurate simulation of composite behavior for virtual product development environments.
MSC.Software Corp. • Santa Ana, CA • mscsoftware.com
AlphaSTAR Corporation • Long Beach, CA • alphastarcorp.com
These are solutions that further integrate compressed and accurate 3D design data as XVL format files. It allows the easy use of data in everything from engineering and manufacturing departments to sales and marketing websites.
Most notable among the additions to the product line are the new interference checking and design validation tools specified and developed with the Toyota Motor Company. According to Toyota, which is currently using the tools, the time spent on interference checking was reduced by about two thirds.
XVL Studio leverages the high compression available in XVL formats to help cut time and computing power needed to explore and validate product models in traditional CAD systems. The result is an accurate but “light-weight” representation of the 3D model rendered at the desired resolution by Lattice 3D’s free viewer software.
Highlights of XVL Studio include improved dimensioning and measuring; enhanced cross-sectioning and other viewing with multiple windows and snapshots; MultiCAD Solution and snap in assembly; better animation; static and dynamic interference detection; and more.
Lattice 3D • Los Altos, CA • lattice3d.com
John Hilton knows all about spatial controllers: In the early 1980s, he invented the original Spaceball and oversaw the development of many subsequent generations of spatial controller technology.
Hilton’s new company, Spatial Freedom, is selling the Astroid 6000. The Astroid looks like spatial devices you have considered before: It has a ball that you lightly push, pull, and twist with your fingertips to move, pan, and walk through the design on your screen. It offers six degrees of freedom and full manipulation of 3D objects to emulate what you would do with an object in your hands.
The Astroid uses precision, noncontact optical sensors as well as a new four-arm interior design, arranged to form the corners of a tetrahedron. The design makes it easier to manufacture, so it costs less to assemble.
Another difference is that Astroid works with MCAD applications natively, not as a modified add-on. There is no “program me” screen, resulting in a tool that’s easy to use and complementary with your software.
Features include eight programmable function keys, a 2D scroll hat that works like the scroll wheel on a mouse, and USB connectivity. Solid Edge, NX, CATIA, and Pro/E are supported, with more to come; so is a developer’s kit. Price: $149.
Spatial Freedom, Inc. • Needham Heights, MA • spatialfreedom.com
Autodesk and Alias have agreed to a deal in which Autodesk will acquire the developer of 3D graphics technology for $182 million in cash. The deal is expected to be complete within the next six months.
Autodesk COO Carl Bass said the deal would help answer demands from Autodesk design customers for “more powerful visualization, animation, and publishing capabilities.”
Autodesk’s manufacturing solutions are expected to get a big boost from Alias products like Alias StudioTools, software that adds industrial design and high-end visualization to design tasks from 2D sketches to final production models.
Autodesk • San Rafael, CA • autodesk.com
Alias • Toronto, ONT • alias.com
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DE’s editors contribute news and new product announcements to Digital Engineering.
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