CATIA

The allround genius for product development

For internationally successful products, today everything has to be just right – innovative technology, customer-specific variability, intuitive handling, highest quality, competitive price and a unique, brand-typical design. In order to make leading products ready for the market, you require an interdisciplinary team of experts that has the cross-company specific knowhow of the product and the manufacturing process and one that closely collaborates on a continuous basis.

Good for you if you use the allround genius CATIA for product development with which all development tasks can be effectively solved similarly and the consistent product data model of which consolidates all engineering disciplines without interfaces.

Whether your personal contribution involves industrial design, design engineering, volume or surface modeling, sheet processing, drawings, knowledge-based engineering, toolmaking, mechatronic development, 3D circuit board layout, composite components, electrical wiring, piping design, FEM simulation (CAE), NC manufacturing (CAM) or digital validation (DMU) – to name just a few – CATIA offers every user a custom-tailored solution for their specific tasks.

Challenges

Due to increasing customer expectations and international competition, companies are forced to develop new, innovative, inspiring, intelligent and resource-friendly products in ever shorter intervals. The trend toward ever-more complex products with higher diversity and increasing electronic and mechatronic share subjects companies to entirely new challenges.

Many development teams therefore have to battle it out with problems such as these:

Barriers and inconsistencies through various development tools for complete specification and validation of the product
Insufficient coordination in the case of distributed development locations as well as with external partners and vendors
Information silos lead to lacking transparency in multidisciplinary system development and validation
Heterogenous system worlds complicate the targeted storage and distribution of corporate knowledge
Multiple administration of product and manufacturing data in various point solutions cause inconsistencies and unnecessary iteration loops in the product development process
Frequent late and costly changes due to insufficient validation of the product design in the early development phases
"Reinventing the wheel" instead of making use of proven knowledge as searching parts and data stocks is too time-consuming
Complex CAD structures and an unknown parts history complicate reuse and change The development of sophisticated products therefore calls for effective teamwork throughout all disciplines with the largest degree of transparency in the conceptual design, form finding, system development, multidisciplinary development, detailed engineering, validation, equipment design – and all of this despite the fact there is less and less time and budget available for individual projects

Benefits

The integrated Dassault Systèmes 3DExperience development environment simplifies operation and supports comprehensive product understanding
The consistent product data model of CATIA avoids interface losses and data silos throughout all development phases
Effective collaboration and improved system understanding by networking all engineering disciplines as well as the downstream units
Command of the diversity through system-aided concepts for the reuse of business standards and integrated knowledge management
Reduction of physical prototypes and time-consuming real test scenarios through virtual simulation and testing
Innovative solutions for online and offline collaboration keep all process members in distributed development teams informed at all times
The transparent geometrical structure and the intelligent features in CATIA facilitate change design, particularly in terms of unknown and complex geometrical structures

Reference et-parts Implementation and Configuration of the 3DEXPERIENCE PLM solution for CATIA V5 Read more about

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Solutions

Mechanical design

The CATIA mechanical environment offers comprehensive tools for the generation of 3D parts of all kinds – from cast, forging, processing and metal sheet parts to mechanical assemblies – on a centrally integrated infrastructure for the easiest online collaboration.

All engineers and designers can work simultaneously on product specifications, from the requirements to the conceptional and physical definition
Live Shape offers a revolutionary direct 3D modeling concept, that quickly realizes 3D ideas and concepts and that aids in the structuring of ideas and concepts, with which existing designs can be changed without any extensive costs

Shaping

CATIA Shape solutions offer an extremely productive environment for the simple shaping and visualization of the design. It has comprehensive tool for esthetic forms of all kinds - to generate, test and change shapes from class A freeform surfaces to smooth manufacturing-appropriate shapes.

A unique, integrated solution for the effortless and quick generation of further hybrid forms from the concept to the detailed design
High-performance curve and surface-based tools for the generation of high-quality shapes
Modeling technologies that offer a high degree of productivity and efficiency for all industry segments
Surface modelling that all employees can command
Photo-realistic rendering and high-performance real-time design validation to ensure design quality

System development

CATIA Systems offers solutions for the parallel development and integration of electrical, electronic as well as hydraulic and pneumatic systems within a digital 3D model. These solutions specifically suited for various industries extend mechanical product descriptions into holistic system specifications.

Modeling and simulation of heterogeneous physical systems on the basis of the open, object-oriented language Modelica. The freely available and commercial libraries, as well as the simple reusability of own components reduce modeling costs considerably.
Definition and simulation of control systems via formal language. Various editors are available for behavior modeling: Status diagram, data flow diagram and sequential function diagram

Equipment

CATIA Equipment Solutions offer of series of products which enable the simultaneous development and integration of electrical and mechanical systems as well as flow systems within a digital 3D model.

The electric products offer a process-oriented solution to design and install electrical systems and cable harnesses controlled by logic circuit diagrams. The consistent process also supports cable harness manufacturing and documentation
The hydraulic and pneumatic design generates and administers the specification and geometric characteristics of piping networks, whereby terminology and standardized conventions of various industries are taken into consideration

Knowledgeware

CATIA Knowledgeware offers numerous tools with which developers can define, reuse and share their knowledge in the extended enterprise. In V6, Knowledgeware supports Lifecycle Management of company knowledge for reuse in design and manufacturing.

Knowledgebases can be integrated within a design and put to use later on, in order to prevent errors and to automate the design process
To comply with defined standards, company knowledge can be documented, set up, managed and applied in rule bases
Intelligent construction templates unify geometry and know-how for simplified reuse

Simulation

CATIA simulation solutions offer a calculation environment in which designers can independently perform and administer simulations. Linear and non-linear simulations examine the realistic behavior of models in various stress situations.

Simulations generate relevant knowledge for the improvement of product performance. They reduce the number of physical prototypes and tests
The management of simulations and simulation results extends traditional PLM concepts, by documenting specific FEM expert knowledge and making proven best practices available in a process-reliable fashion even to individuals who are not experts

Products

CATIA is the pioneering product of Dassault Systèmes. Today, CATIA is the world's leading solution for product development and innovation, used successfully in companies of all sizes, from SMEs to large-scale OEMs and their supplier chains.

CATIA Assessment

CATIA V5 is the leading software solution for the development and the definition of the complete digital product model. Through its process-oriented scalability, CATIA V5 covers the entire product development process – from the concept idea to maintenance.

CATIA V5 PLM Express offers SMEs the quickest path to CATIA V5 including coordinated Product Data Management (PDM). The offered PLM Express packages make the choice for the optimum solution for all tasks and requirements easy. The preconfigured packages are based on task descriptions that support specific engineering disciplines as well as typical activities in the development process.

CATIA V6 embodies the the next generation of the now 30-year old success story and offers a comprehensive service range for the cross-discipline development and global collaboration in virtual development teams. The area of application of CATIA V6 goes far beyond traditional 3D-CAD software tools, as it conveys a unique digital product experience, based on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform. It is used to plan all aspects of the product, to uniquely specify, multiphysically simulate, realistically visualize and thus make them fully comprehensible and assessable.

With V6 and the 3DEXPERIENCE platform, various brands and solutions of Dassault Systèmes – CATIA, ENOVIA, DELMIA, SIMULIA, CATIA Composer, DYMOLA, ICEM, EXALEAD, NETVIBES – are integrated via a consistent user concept and integrated product data model to a seamless solution.