I have been using personal computers for about a decade now. Some 5 years ago, I used to own a Pentium 100, with 32 megs of RAM and a 1.2GB hard drive. Now, I run an Athlon XP2400+ with 512MB of RAM and an 80GB hard drive. In the world of mechanical design, this would be the equivalent of upgrading from a 2000i to a Wildfire 2.0 package. And yet, come to think of it, I used to get more or less the same things done with my old PC as I do with the new one.
Sure, the XP 2400+ is about a zillion times faster than the old P100, but more often than not, it only gets used for logging onto the internet, writing emails and other documents, and messing around a bit with images shot on a digital camera. Sometimes, I think it’s just one big conspiracy, hatched to make us keep maxing out our credit cards and keep PC manufacturers minting money. We end up buying bazookas when all we need, perhaps, is a shotgun. Which is where the new Wildfire 2.0 comes in – it gives you just enough.
The MCAD industry in the world saw a fair amount of action this year. The market got new contenders like Solid Edge v15, AutoCAD 2004, Solid Works 2004, and the new CATIA V5R12. And though they haven’t been launched yet, Autodesk Inventor 9, SolidWorks 2005, Pro/E Wildfire (probably to be badged Wildfire 2.0) are lurking around in the very near future.
If that weren’t enough, there have been numerous price corrections and revisions across the board in all segments, and MCAD developers and dealers are striking various kinds of packaged deals alike. The MCAD market in India still has a long way to go before it can be called mature (by Western standards, of course), but we are at least steadily on our way.
So, why a Wildfire 2.0? Why not stick with Wildfire, which is already doing fairly well. Well, it comes down to simple mathematics. With Wildfire 2.0, PTC hopes to take advantage of the blurring line between SolidWorks 2004 and Solid Edge V15. While Wildfire goes head-to-head against software like SolidWorks 2003 and Autodesk Inventor 7, the new and more user-friendly Wildfire 2.0 is pitted directly against the new SolidWorks 2004, which is its most likely competitor.
With the new Wildfire 2.0, PTC decided to field refinement, few mouse clicks, and easy use in place of the previous version’s power and FTD (fun-to-design) factors. And PTC realizes they stand a chance of making a killing here. To give an example of one of the new capabilities of Wildfire 2.0, it can now create rotational patterns using the new Axial option. Hence, you do not need to create Datums on-the-fly to create rotational patterns. A full test of the production release of Pro/E Wildfire 2.0 will confirm things, but on the face of it, the pre-production seems to be in a good position to win the battle of the spec sheets.
Article Date: April 2003
Friday, July 16, 2010
India’s Future in Engineering Design
In this article we will see an overview of the engineering design market and the potential that India has to become a leader in this market. We will look at the key industries requiring engineering design, the range of engineering design products on offer, the potential global market, and India as the outsourcing destination.
Facts
- Global Engineering design services market = USD $7 billion per year.
- Automotive design = 68%
- Aerospace design = 16%
- Electronic machinery design = 12%
- 20% of design services are outsourced to 3rd party players.
- Major players for outsourcing: India, Philippines, China, and Taiwan.
- India has emerged as a major global design center, with global majors like Airbus, Caterpillar, Boeing, Emerson, Whirlpool, Ford, Snecma, GM, DaimlerChrysler, BMW, Mercedes Benz, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, John Deere, United Technologies, Johnson Controls, and Ingersoll Rand outsourcing their engineering design requirements either to in-house centers or 3rd party vendors.
- Indian IT companies with substantial presence in the engineering design space include: TCS, Infosys, Satyam, NIIT, and HCL Technologies. Some of the focused engineering design players in India are: Infotech enterprises, Rolta, Axis, Geometric Software, Quest, Plexion Technologies, Quantech and Easitech.
Key Industries Requiring Engineering Design
Engineering design has a key role to play in the following industries:
- Aerospace
- Automotive
- Electronic and Industrial Machinery
Aerospace
Aerospace has three basic industry segments: defense, commercial aircraft, and space.
The major players in the defense market are Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Raytheon, BAE Systems, General Dynamics, EADS, Thales, and United Technologies.
Major players of the commercial aircraft market are GE Aircraft Engines, Pratt & Whitney, and Rolls Royce.
Major players of space market are Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Alcatel Space, Astrium, Orbital Sciences, and Arianespace.
Some domestic players are NAL and HAL.
Automotive
The major international players in the automotive market are Toyota Motor, Honda, Nissan Motor, Mitusbishi, Opel, DaimlerChrysler, General Motors, Ford, Volvo, Hyundai and Johnson Controls.
Some domestic players are Maruti, Tata, Hero, Mahindra, Escorts, Royal Enfield, Bajaj, TVS, LML, Kinetic, and Hindustan Motors.
Electronic and Industrial Machinery
The major international players in the electronic and industrial machinery market are GE Group, Caterpillar, Terex Vectra, Deere and Company, Emerson Electric, Sony, LG, Samsung, Whirlpool, Nokia, and Sanyo.
Some domestic players are TAFE, JCB, Ashok Leyland, BHEL, Punjab Tractors Limited, and DCM.
Engineering Design Products
Engineering design products broadly fall into two categories – one that facilitates creating the actual design and the second that allows engineers to collaborate and manage design. The former type includes the traditional tools of Computer Aided Design (CAD), Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM), and Computer Aided Engineering (CAE), and the latter category includes Collaborative Product Commerce (CPC) and Product Data Management (PDM) tools. However, the focus has now shifted to Product Life Cycle Management (PLM) solutions that integrate the design, collaboration, and data management aspects.
Leading Product Vendors
PTC
PTC’s Pro/ENGINEER is among the world’s leading Mechanical Computer Aided Design (MCAD) softwares. The latest release of Wildfire has PLM capabilities.
Autodesk
Autodesk has product solutions for design and drafting, land development, architectural design, mechanical design, graphic information systems, design visualization, production, editing, visual effects, and animation. Autodesk AutoCAD, Architectural Desktop, Autodesk Inventor Series, and Autodesk Map Series are some of the company’s leading products.
Dassault Systemes
Dassault Systemes is a global leader in the market for PLM software using 3D technology. Dassault Systemes has solutions that provide a 3D view of the product’s lifecycle, from creation to maintenance, including manufacturing and startup. Dassault Systemes first launched CATIA that is one of the world’s most pervasive 3D modeling softwares in the world. Then came the 3D PLM solution with DELMIA, its manufacturing solutions package. ENOVIA and SMARTEAM completed the 3D PLM offering. SolidWorks Corporation - a Dassault Systemes company - helped a large number of 2D users to make transition to 3D modeling techniques.
Siemens PLM (Formerly UGS)
EDS launched PLM Solutions by combining the former Unigraphics Solutions (UGS) and Structural Dynamics Research Corporation (SDRC), both of which were acquired by EDS and were sold to become UGS. Products are I-deas NX Series and Teamcenter.
Global Market
On average, the global aerospace, automotive, and industrial machinery companies spend around 3-5% of their revenues on R&D. For instance, in fiscal year 2002, Boeing spent US$1,639 million on R&D on revenues of US$54,609 million. Toyota and Caterpillar spent US$4,423 million and US$854 million on R&D on revenues of US$130,806 million and US$20,152 respectively. Of the R&D spent, about 30% constitutes money spent on design. This figure would vary marginally across industries. Of this spending on design, about 40% is potentially outsourceable. A company may keep the core design work while outsourcing the non-core design work. This is primarily on account of apprehensions regarding Intellectual Property (IP) misuse. Ultimately, companies have to make a call as to what percentage of the overall design work has to be outsourced.
(All figures are from Yahoo finance and Nasscom)
It is estimated that the global market potential for outsourced engineering design is in excess of US$7 billion per annum.
To sum up, the following are key trends that are noticeable in the engineering design sector:
- Outsourcing is the need: The overall global slowdown in the aerospace, automotive, and industrial machinery sectors is resulting in Fortune 500 companies squeezing costs and exploring lower cost geographies.
- Global players are setting up their own design centers in India. Ford, Caterpillar, Snecma, Emerson, Whirlpool, and GE are some of the global corporations that have set up subsidiaries in India for design.
- Global players are outsourcing design work to Indian IT services players and specialized engineering design outfits. For example, both Airbus and Boeing outsource their design work to Infosys.
- Infrastructure and Software is improving: The advent of PLM tools and the rapid improvements in the telecommunications infrastructure in India are allowing companies to setup virtual design teams. This is allowing Fortune 500 companies to set up their design subsidiaries in lower cost geographies like India.
- Acquiring stakes in Indian IT Companies: Companies that do not want to set up subsidiaries but still want to maintain adequate control over the outsourced work are taking up strategic stakes in companies to whom they are outsourcing. For example, Pratt & Whitney outsources design of aircraft components to Infotech Enterprises and has taken up 18% in the company.
India as an Outsourced Engineering Design Destination
Globally, software product companies dominate the software landscape. In case of the Indian market, it is the services-based companies that dominate the scene. A major reason for this is the high-risk profile of the product segment. This segment typically involves huge research and development investments; enormous marketing networks; and the chances of product success are rather limited.
Until now, the work that has been outsourced to India was mainly high volume, low value work like scanning drawings and converting them into digital format, markup of old drawings and migration of CAD data from one package to another. This kind of service fetches around US$ 10 to 15 per man-hour. However, in recent times, with data connectivity between India and rest of the world improving vastly and Western companies facing tremendous cost and time to market pressures, high-end engineering design work is being outsourced to India - tasks like 3D modeling, finite analysis, computational fluid analysis, and plant design. These tasks are paid anywhere from US$25 to US$35 per man-hour in India.
Article Date: year 2004
Facts
- Global Engineering design services market = USD $7 billion per year.
- Automotive design = 68%
- Aerospace design = 16%
- Electronic machinery design = 12%
- 20% of design services are outsourced to 3rd party players.
- Major players for outsourcing: India, Philippines, China, and Taiwan.
- India has emerged as a major global design center, with global majors like Airbus, Caterpillar, Boeing, Emerson, Whirlpool, Ford, Snecma, GM, DaimlerChrysler, BMW, Mercedes Benz, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, John Deere, United Technologies, Johnson Controls, and Ingersoll Rand outsourcing their engineering design requirements either to in-house centers or 3rd party vendors.
- Indian IT companies with substantial presence in the engineering design space include: TCS, Infosys, Satyam, NIIT, and HCL Technologies. Some of the focused engineering design players in India are: Infotech enterprises, Rolta, Axis, Geometric Software, Quest, Plexion Technologies, Quantech and Easitech.
Key Industries Requiring Engineering Design
Engineering design has a key role to play in the following industries:
- Aerospace
- Automotive
- Electronic and Industrial Machinery
Aerospace
Aerospace has three basic industry segments: defense, commercial aircraft, and space.
The major players in the defense market are Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Boeing, Raytheon, BAE Systems, General Dynamics, EADS, Thales, and United Technologies.
Major players of the commercial aircraft market are GE Aircraft Engines, Pratt & Whitney, and Rolls Royce.
Major players of space market are Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Alcatel Space, Astrium, Orbital Sciences, and Arianespace.
Some domestic players are NAL and HAL.
Automotive
The major international players in the automotive market are Toyota Motor, Honda, Nissan Motor, Mitusbishi, Opel, DaimlerChrysler, General Motors, Ford, Volvo, Hyundai and Johnson Controls.
Some domestic players are Maruti, Tata, Hero, Mahindra, Escorts, Royal Enfield, Bajaj, TVS, LML, Kinetic, and Hindustan Motors.
Electronic and Industrial Machinery
The major international players in the electronic and industrial machinery market are GE Group, Caterpillar, Terex Vectra, Deere and Company, Emerson Electric, Sony, LG, Samsung, Whirlpool, Nokia, and Sanyo.
Some domestic players are TAFE, JCB, Ashok Leyland, BHEL, Punjab Tractors Limited, and DCM.
Engineering Design Products
Engineering design products broadly fall into two categories – one that facilitates creating the actual design and the second that allows engineers to collaborate and manage design. The former type includes the traditional tools of Computer Aided Design (CAD), Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM), and Computer Aided Engineering (CAE), and the latter category includes Collaborative Product Commerce (CPC) and Product Data Management (PDM) tools. However, the focus has now shifted to Product Life Cycle Management (PLM) solutions that integrate the design, collaboration, and data management aspects.
Leading Product Vendors
PTC
PTC’s Pro/ENGINEER is among the world’s leading Mechanical Computer Aided Design (MCAD) softwares. The latest release of Wildfire has PLM capabilities.
Autodesk
Autodesk has product solutions for design and drafting, land development, architectural design, mechanical design, graphic information systems, design visualization, production, editing, visual effects, and animation. Autodesk AutoCAD, Architectural Desktop, Autodesk Inventor Series, and Autodesk Map Series are some of the company’s leading products.
Dassault Systemes
Dassault Systemes is a global leader in the market for PLM software using 3D technology. Dassault Systemes has solutions that provide a 3D view of the product’s lifecycle, from creation to maintenance, including manufacturing and startup. Dassault Systemes first launched CATIA that is one of the world’s most pervasive 3D modeling softwares in the world. Then came the 3D PLM solution with DELMIA, its manufacturing solutions package. ENOVIA and SMARTEAM completed the 3D PLM offering. SolidWorks Corporation - a Dassault Systemes company - helped a large number of 2D users to make transition to 3D modeling techniques.
Siemens PLM (Formerly UGS)
EDS launched PLM Solutions by combining the former Unigraphics Solutions (UGS) and Structural Dynamics Research Corporation (SDRC), both of which were acquired by EDS and were sold to become UGS. Products are I-deas NX Series and Teamcenter.
Global Market
On average, the global aerospace, automotive, and industrial machinery companies spend around 3-5% of their revenues on R&D. For instance, in fiscal year 2002, Boeing spent US$1,639 million on R&D on revenues of US$54,609 million. Toyota and Caterpillar spent US$4,423 million and US$854 million on R&D on revenues of US$130,806 million and US$20,152 respectively. Of the R&D spent, about 30% constitutes money spent on design. This figure would vary marginally across industries. Of this spending on design, about 40% is potentially outsourceable. A company may keep the core design work while outsourcing the non-core design work. This is primarily on account of apprehensions regarding Intellectual Property (IP) misuse. Ultimately, companies have to make a call as to what percentage of the overall design work has to be outsourced.
(All figures are from Yahoo finance and Nasscom)
It is estimated that the global market potential for outsourced engineering design is in excess of US$7 billion per annum.
To sum up, the following are key trends that are noticeable in the engineering design sector:
- Outsourcing is the need: The overall global slowdown in the aerospace, automotive, and industrial machinery sectors is resulting in Fortune 500 companies squeezing costs and exploring lower cost geographies.
- Global players are setting up their own design centers in India. Ford, Caterpillar, Snecma, Emerson, Whirlpool, and GE are some of the global corporations that have set up subsidiaries in India for design.
- Global players are outsourcing design work to Indian IT services players and specialized engineering design outfits. For example, both Airbus and Boeing outsource their design work to Infosys.
- Infrastructure and Software is improving: The advent of PLM tools and the rapid improvements in the telecommunications infrastructure in India are allowing companies to setup virtual design teams. This is allowing Fortune 500 companies to set up their design subsidiaries in lower cost geographies like India.
- Acquiring stakes in Indian IT Companies: Companies that do not want to set up subsidiaries but still want to maintain adequate control over the outsourced work are taking up strategic stakes in companies to whom they are outsourcing. For example, Pratt & Whitney outsources design of aircraft components to Infotech Enterprises and has taken up 18% in the company.
India as an Outsourced Engineering Design Destination
Globally, software product companies dominate the software landscape. In case of the Indian market, it is the services-based companies that dominate the scene. A major reason for this is the high-risk profile of the product segment. This segment typically involves huge research and development investments; enormous marketing networks; and the chances of product success are rather limited.
Until now, the work that has been outsourced to India was mainly high volume, low value work like scanning drawings and converting them into digital format, markup of old drawings and migration of CAD data from one package to another. This kind of service fetches around US$ 10 to 15 per man-hour. However, in recent times, with data connectivity between India and rest of the world improving vastly and Western companies facing tremendous cost and time to market pressures, high-end engineering design work is being outsourced to India - tasks like 3D modeling, finite analysis, computational fluid analysis, and plant design. These tasks are paid anywhere from US$25 to US$35 per man-hour in India.
Article Date: year 2004
Implementation of Intellectual Property Rights in Design R&D
Intellectual Property rights (IPR) has always been viewed as a cost center and never associated with revenue-driving initiative. This makes it difficult to get approval and justify security budgets and expenditures on IP registration, CAD packages, design outsourcing, CAD training, processes and procedures.
In the past, the effectiveness of IPR spending has used soft measurements-aspects such as spending on IPR services relative to the value of the design, or by preventing the leak of design information from the work place to the competitors. This created residual space, because it didn’t demonstrate cost savings/profit or IP loss from/to the competitors.
Developing appropriate Intellectual Property (IP) risk metrics can help you communicate the business value of an effective R&D program to your organization’s senior management. Through such metrics, you can assign measurable values to your R&D posture, allowing you to show tangible results.
Most manufacturing companies have finite budgets to spend on R&D. If, for instance, you have $100 to spend on R&D, where and how do you spend that money? Do you need to purchase a CAD package or outsource work and how does it subsequently impact your IP rights? Will you at some point lose the value of these CAD packages? At what instance will you receive the most value out of your R&D investments? Or, are you simply wasting money?
Many R&D managers cannot assess to what extent a CAD package is going to save their IP rights, or how much dollar loss will accrue without the use of a particular CAD package. Suitable IP risk metrics is required in order to measure or track a particular leak, and without a measure of perceived profits it’s useless. Such a metrics not only helps reduce the potential of threat or vulnerability of your designs but also enables you to determine the effectiveness of R&D.
Risk
Where do you begin? If you have no IP policy there is nothing to base on. The control processes and procedures must be clearly articulated. With the policy in place, you need to understand the design inventory. Next you must decide which designs need protection. If you don’t know their value, you will not know the monetary or man-hour protection of the designs you are providing. Once you have taken design inventory stock, you need to prioritize each design based on their risk leak. Is every single design in your inventory subjected to high-risk threat? Probably not. A priority mechanism must be drawn, classifying each of the designs into high, medium or low-risk assets. If you fail to identify which designs to protect, especially the highest risk ones, you will not profit with your IPR budget. It is likely that many have not prioritized your assets, but you must.
Next you must analyze what and how are your assets being subjected to vulnerabilities. Identify the threats from your competitors. Once you recognize your assets, vulnerabilities, and threats, you can calculate the risk. The product of these three parameters calculates risk and when each is measured the R&D engineers can apply remediation to high-risk designs followed by medium and low-risk designs.
Finally, you must ensure compliance with corporate and government regulations.
It is essential to analyze threat data on a daily or weekly basis and observe which designs are at high-risk. You must correlate threat, assets, and vulnerabilities frequently and change certain policies and procedures by assessing risk. This becomes a vicious cycle.
Measuring Process
Every company can develop its own measuring process. A basic metrics evaluation involves considering compliance at vendor, database, and designer’s levels. The score could range from zero if a design is not registered as IP to five if it exists. At the vendor level, all designs are under IPR, scoring five. However, the IP application is under screening, so the score could be two.
Through such scoring mechanism, one clearly envisions future spending during the next R&D budget.
Scoring zero on a particular design does not indicate need for investment. If you score zero on inventory of fixtures and your company is into design of medical equipments, then you do not need to invest on getting the fixtures under IP.
However, your business may require security to your new equipment designs, and so you need to invest. You can similarly develop your own metrics.
Risks vs. Money
You need to constantly monitor your competitor’s moves and bunch of new products in the market. Many R&D organizations prefer to utilize IP consultancies from an outside party. If you spend on IP, you should notice fewer IP conflicts in your company. The key is to validate your return on IP investment (RoIPI). You can also sell your IP rights to another company after keeping it with you for some time.
IP spending ensures continuous lead in the market thus keeping you products demand. By buying a CAD package you make sure that your design at conceptual stage is within your R&D team thus having a full control on it. Only then the investment on CAD package is validated.
These metrics can be used as a guide for spending and resource allocation, by showing specific returns on investments and tangible change measures. The metrics can be diligently tracked, benchmarked against industry averages. Companies can also compare the scores of their individual designs to apply the right IP measures to greatest risk areas in order to achieve significant cost reductions.
You now have a structure and standard to demonstrate the organization’s health from a security standpoint.
In the past, the effectiveness of IPR spending has used soft measurements-aspects such as spending on IPR services relative to the value of the design, or by preventing the leak of design information from the work place to the competitors. This created residual space, because it didn’t demonstrate cost savings/profit or IP loss from/to the competitors.
Developing appropriate Intellectual Property (IP) risk metrics can help you communicate the business value of an effective R&D program to your organization’s senior management. Through such metrics, you can assign measurable values to your R&D posture, allowing you to show tangible results.
Most manufacturing companies have finite budgets to spend on R&D. If, for instance, you have $100 to spend on R&D, where and how do you spend that money? Do you need to purchase a CAD package or outsource work and how does it subsequently impact your IP rights? Will you at some point lose the value of these CAD packages? At what instance will you receive the most value out of your R&D investments? Or, are you simply wasting money?
Many R&D managers cannot assess to what extent a CAD package is going to save their IP rights, or how much dollar loss will accrue without the use of a particular CAD package. Suitable IP risk metrics is required in order to measure or track a particular leak, and without a measure of perceived profits it’s useless. Such a metrics not only helps reduce the potential of threat or vulnerability of your designs but also enables you to determine the effectiveness of R&D.
Risk
Where do you begin? If you have no IP policy there is nothing to base on. The control processes and procedures must be clearly articulated. With the policy in place, you need to understand the design inventory. Next you must decide which designs need protection. If you don’t know their value, you will not know the monetary or man-hour protection of the designs you are providing. Once you have taken design inventory stock, you need to prioritize each design based on their risk leak. Is every single design in your inventory subjected to high-risk threat? Probably not. A priority mechanism must be drawn, classifying each of the designs into high, medium or low-risk assets. If you fail to identify which designs to protect, especially the highest risk ones, you will not profit with your IPR budget. It is likely that many have not prioritized your assets, but you must.
Next you must analyze what and how are your assets being subjected to vulnerabilities. Identify the threats from your competitors. Once you recognize your assets, vulnerabilities, and threats, you can calculate the risk. The product of these three parameters calculates risk and when each is measured the R&D engineers can apply remediation to high-risk designs followed by medium and low-risk designs.
Finally, you must ensure compliance with corporate and government regulations.
It is essential to analyze threat data on a daily or weekly basis and observe which designs are at high-risk. You must correlate threat, assets, and vulnerabilities frequently and change certain policies and procedures by assessing risk. This becomes a vicious cycle.
Measuring Process
Every company can develop its own measuring process. A basic metrics evaluation involves considering compliance at vendor, database, and designer’s levels. The score could range from zero if a design is not registered as IP to five if it exists. At the vendor level, all designs are under IPR, scoring five. However, the IP application is under screening, so the score could be two.
Through such scoring mechanism, one clearly envisions future spending during the next R&D budget.
Scoring zero on a particular design does not indicate need for investment. If you score zero on inventory of fixtures and your company is into design of medical equipments, then you do not need to invest on getting the fixtures under IP.
However, your business may require security to your new equipment designs, and so you need to invest. You can similarly develop your own metrics.
Risks vs. Money
You need to constantly monitor your competitor’s moves and bunch of new products in the market. Many R&D organizations prefer to utilize IP consultancies from an outside party. If you spend on IP, you should notice fewer IP conflicts in your company. The key is to validate your return on IP investment (RoIPI). You can also sell your IP rights to another company after keeping it with you for some time.
IP spending ensures continuous lead in the market thus keeping you products demand. By buying a CAD package you make sure that your design at conceptual stage is within your R&D team thus having a full control on it. Only then the investment on CAD package is validated.
These metrics can be used as a guide for spending and resource allocation, by showing specific returns on investments and tangible change measures. The metrics can be diligently tracked, benchmarked against industry averages. Companies can also compare the scores of their individual designs to apply the right IP measures to greatest risk areas in order to achieve significant cost reductions.
You now have a structure and standard to demonstrate the organization’s health from a security standpoint.
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