Cloud Computing Grows Up - The Future of Manufacturing Design and Engineering

The moment has arrived in the evolution of cloud computing for the cloud to move beyond collaboration and office-productivity applications toward the delivery of business capabilities previously not possible. One business sector where this is happening is manufacturing, where leveraging the power of the cloud helps businesses solve tough design and engineering challenges in the product development process. The cloud allows designers, engineers, and digital artists to extend their desktops with greater mobility; high performance rendering and design optimization capabilities; and more computing power. As a next step, the cloud is about to make the impossible possible for manufacturers, as companies will be able to optimize designs through virtually unlimited variations and simulations as well as create high quality photo realistic renderings – all without accessing local computing resources and saving significant time. One of the main benefits of cloud computing is the capacity to perform multiple jobs simultaneously, as well as perform extremely large jobs, which, will lead to better engineered and performing designs, and, ultimately better products, buildings or infrastructure. For example, to do a single design rendering in the cloud, users can increase the speed by three to five times and achieve comparable image quality. Studies show that these time savings increase exponentially: Users can do ten renderings in a total of ten minutes vs. five hours to perform the same ten renderings on a local machine. Attendee takeaways: • How seamless access to the cloud provides users with unlimited computing power and storage, two of the biggest barriers to adoption of the most advanced design, engineering and visualization software techniques. • The importance of manufacturers to be able to tap into the cloud’s immense processing power to perform simulation to optimize their designs. • The cloud’s potential to dramatically improve the overall design and creative process through more rapid design renderings; more design iterations using less time and resources; and easier, seamless collaboration. • The cloud’s contribution to achieving carbon neutrality in buildings - architects and contractors rely on the cloud to determine the sustainable performance of a building, being able to access, analyze, and share vast amounts of data to perform faster, more accurate energy analysis. • How designers and engineers can innovate more with the cloud by exploring more design alternatives; working with greater mobility; and bringing more computing power to bear on their design and engineering processes.

- by Scott Reese

Author`s Bio:
As Senior Director for Simulation in Autodesk’s Manufacturing Industry Group, Scott Reese is responsible for managing all of the company’s simulation applications and maximize its ability to leverage all simulation technology, including Moldflow and the Factory Design Suite. Prior to assuming his current position, Mr. Reese was Senior Director of the Autodesk Digital Factory team, focused on delivering innovations in digital prototyping solutions. Prior to managing the Digital Factory group, Mr. Reese launched the Emerging Products & Technologies (EP&T) group at Autodesk, delivering the iLogic technology and Inventor Fusion into the market. He also served as Product Line Manager for AutoCAD Electrical and AutoCAD Mechanical. He joined Autodesk in March 2003 with the acquisition of VIA Development Corporation where he served as Vice President. Scott Reese holds a bachelor of science degree in computer science from Indiana Wesleyan University and a Masters in Business Administration degree from Harvard Business School.