The unexpected value of CAE in-CAD for reporting managers, business leaders and the whole engineering ecosystem at the organization.
Launching a new product is a team effort. It starts on a design engineer’s desk, but it truly involves people from all walks of life. For instance, sales, marketing and manufacturing are often needed in the development process. However, they are not habitually updated on the latest designs, which can lead to delays, downtime, errors and recalls. People from various roles are also required in the development process — from simulation experts to reporting managers and business leaders — but keeping them updated on the latest designs can be just as challenging and the effects just as detrimental.
“There are several things to consider here and the first is collaboration,” says Julien Simon, senior product manager of NX Performance Predictor at Siemens Digital Industries Software. “People need to collaborate during the development phase of a product. I think the unique challenge is how can we continue to improve our work and design.”
Processes like simulation-led design, via tools like CAE in-CAD, may sound like they only benefit simulation experts and design engineers. But according to Julien Simon, its benefits ripple throughout an organization. He shared his thoughts on how simulation-led design and CAE in-CAD benefit design engineers, reporting managers and business leaders. He also explains how simulation experts fit into this new design paradigm.
How design engineers benefit from CAE in-CAD — and the role of experts
In the engineering profession there can still be siloes. For instance, the gap of knowledge between designers and simulation experts, or the gap between engineers from one discipline to another.
“To progress in your design workflow, you need to get feedback from each one,” says Julien Simon. “This takes time because you need to exchange information.” This information will often need to be tailored to the workflows of the individual receiving it. Transforming the data this way can be tedious, costly and time consuming. And the person receiving it can’t instantly return feedback. They will need to perform their own analysis, which again, takes time. Meanwhile, feedback is easier to implement into a design when it’s received as soon as possible — so the model is fresh in the designer’s mind.
Consider the workflows between the designer and a simulation expert. Traditionally, the designer would send a CAD model to a simulation expert who will then need to:
- Import the file into CAE software.
- Clean up the geometry to ensure that it is compatible with the study (such as making it airtight for a fluid simulation).
- Cut any small geometry that could overly delay results by increasing computations.
Only then could the simulation expert run their analysis which, like the above steps, could take days to complete.
“For an automotive company to produce a part, they may need five to six iterations between design and simulation,” notes Julien Simon. “The design can take two to three days to iterate, and the simulation can take close to a full work week to complete. So, if you make five iterations, that is about 30 days spent iterating on one part. With simulation-led design, you can go down to just one or two iterations, just 10 days.”
Implementing simulation-led design, by embedding CAE tools within a CAD environment, can significantly reduce development times. Now imagine the same individuals are working on producing a new part. Only this time, the designer has access to CAE in-CAD tools. This brings simulation further to the left side of the product development workflow.
Most CAE in-CAD tools are designed to simplify and speed up the simulation workflow, so that most designers with a typical engineer’s understanding of physics can produce results — without an expert. The expert can still validate the work of the designer, but in the meantime they can focus on more complex simulations.
“There are trends of a lot of moving workflows [expanding the scope of traditional engineers] and a lot of engineering newcomers,” says Julien Simon. “So, to provide CAE tools for a beginner to gain knowledge and confidence, this will improve their work and performance.”
These results won’t be as in-depth as what a simulation expert can produce, so they should still be included in the iterative process, but it should be close enough to guide the designer towards a semi-optimized design. Meanwhile, the simulation expert can focus on more in-depth simulations in parallel to the CAD process. This shrinking of the product development Gant chart, via parallel work, should also reduce the total number of iterations to develop or validate a design.
How do reporting managers benefit from all of this?
It’s the reporting manager’s job to synchronize teams and product development processes. Hence, their fundamental duty is to ensure that what is reported between teams is correct and tailored to their needs. Julien Simon explains that with many simulation-led design tools, a part of this data transfer and knowledge sharing is streamlined.
“I saw that for reporting managers, the challenge was they need to understand more of the design,” said Julien Simon. “They then need to take care of, gain and share that knowledge. With simulation-led design they see more productivity and team achievements. They have more KPIs they can use to validate workflows and simulations. They have more things to overlook, and this gives them a way they can validate the data. That gives them more confidence about the project they are discussing.” From Julien Simon’s point of view, it’s about breaking the siloes between teams, engineers and stakeholders by improving communication.
Julien Simon adds that the experience of some stakeholders can also help others on different teams. For instance, after reviewing a simulation, a plant manager may notice there could be an issue producing the part. This can help guide the design team and avoid mistakes later in development. All this communication can then be facilitated by the reporting manager and the design tools.
Why should business leaders care about simulation-led design?
Julien Simon was very upfront about how to discuss the benefits of CAE in-CAD and simulation-led design to business leaders and C-level management. He explained, “from what I’ve discussed with business leaders, simulation moving left isn’t what they are interested in. They are interested in ‘how my team can become more performant.’”
Thus, it is important to show business leaders how simulations can facilitate communication and support initiatives like environmentalism, cost reduction, faster time to market, fewer product delays and reduced manufacturing downtime. In other words, the goal is to show top management that there is a return on investment when shifting simulation to the left.
In this sense, the argument about how simulation-led design can effectively shrink a product development’s Gant chart — by enabling designers and simulation experts to work in parallel — is something business leaders will pay attention to, not the CAE in-CAD tools themselves.
“We are trying to show them that today, development workflows are seen as a line. You start from the beginning with design, then simulation, then manufacturing and so on,” says Julien Simon. “But in reality, the workflow can be more like parallel tracks. By bringing simulation earlier into the process, it exchanges information at an early stage between these tracks, improving the communications between these tracks and decrease the number of iterations.”
There are also unexpected ways that simulation-led design can benefit business leaders. Julien Simon talks of a time he heard a marketing team discussing a product with designers and simulation experts. He said, “In the end, the marketing team put that simulation in the company’s flier because they saw how impressive it was in the meeting. They wanted to share the company’s confidence in its products directly with the consumer.”
NX Performance Predictor and the future of simulation-led design
Julien Simon explains that Siemens Digital Industries Software offers NX Performance Predictor as its specific CAE in-CAD solution. “NX Performance Predictor helps the designer become more performant by helping them use simulation to evaluate a component. With NX Performance Predictor, the idea is to get instantaneous feedback on a part design.”
What sets NX Performance Predictor apart from others is that its environment is optimized to guide simulation newcomers to quickly learn the tool and produce results. “We are making a lot of effort to make the interface and workflows straightforward,” he says. “It’s naturally embedded in the CAD environment so it’s easy to deploy. They don’t need to train on new software, and they don’t need to transfer data from one tool to another. It’s tools they are used to using daily.”
NX Performance Predictor is also optimized to transfer data and geometry to other tools within the Siemens Teamcenter platform, making it easier to share knowledge and communicate with teams. “We see connections between all the data in the enterprise coming,” said Julien Simon. “And we still want to push people to go a step forward to be more performant in their process.” In addition, the NX Performance Predictor simulation data model can be reused in Simcenter for the expert to validate or enrich the simulation.
Julien Simon also hinted towards new features coming to NX Performance Predictor and other Siemens Teamcenter products. For instance, he explained that AI can help democratize simulation — or at least help the user to be more performant — even earlier in the design process. It can, for instance, guide the user during the definition process. He adds that these AI tools won’t replace engineers; rather, they will act as an assistant, help guide users and offer a starting point that then needs to be optimized.
“AI will never replace humans. Human creativity is an important stage,” Julien Simon says. However, “the path to becoming a better designer is not finished today. I see plenty of improvement coming soon.”
To learn more about the role simulation-led design plays in the day-to-day work of a design engineer, read the Performance Predictor installment in the NX Tips and Tricks series.
