Gian Paolo Bassi, the chief executive officer of CAD maker SolidWorks kicked off SolidWorks World, held this week at the Los Angeles convention center, by introducing SolidWorks CAM, to help manufacturing companies with “smart manufacturing.”
Smart manufacturing, he said, uses all the content in 3D models to:
- Recognize how features will be manufactured
- Learn how much it will cost to manufacture
- Understand how to read tolerances and surface finishes
- Obtain information to make smart decisions about how to manufacture and assemble your products
SolidWorks CAM, powered by CAMWorks, will be included on all desktop versions of the CAD software, Bassi said.
At the event, Bassi also spoke about his company’s plans to take CAD online. Last year, the CAD maker previewed its Xdesign, a browser-based design tool. That project now includes a capability Bassi calls computer augmented design. Xdesign recommends to designers the starting shapes they could best use at the beginning a project.
SolidWorks is also developing topology optimization that will connect simulation and geometry, Bassi said. It will help engineers anticipate how to reach engineering goals and then to 3D print intricate micro structures, using technology from SolidWorks partner nTopology.
The design of a part using the bi-directional circular pattern, a feature included within SolidWorks 2017.
Also in company news, 3DExperienceCity has created a virtual twin of the city of Singapore to help that city plan for and understand how to optimize infrastructure, said Bernard Charlès, vice chairman and chief executive officer of Dassault Systèmes, the CAD maker’s parent company.
Conference goers were also updated on the SolidWorks App for Kids, now available to the public. The beta app included about 1,200 creators.
Chin-Loo Lama, the company’s senior user experience manager, talked about two future Apps for Kids features: Game It, in which users place their designs into a gaming environment and Print It, which allows them print models your models in 3D.
The CAD maker works with Sindoh, a 3D printing company in South Korea to develop a 3D Cloud Print workflow. This allows the app to send model data over the internet to a linked Sindoh printer.
Bassi also spoke about the more than 250 features and 520 enhancements included within SolidWorks 2017, introduced in September.
New features include one that converts a chamfer to a fillet for flexible modeling, enhancements to import mesh files, a wrap feature, an offset surface enhancement, and magnetic mates with speedpack enhancements that makes it makes it easy for engineers to manage large modular assemblies.
Also new in SolidWorks 2017 is term licensing in additional to a perpetual licensing model. This allows CAD makers’ customers to ramp up or down the number of systems they license. Customers can purchase a perpetual license of the software or can choose to a quarterly or annual term license.
Structural simulation products from SolidWorks are also now are available via a term license option. The rest of the product line will be available as term license sequentially in future releases, Bassi added.