Industrial design firms must deliver innovative product designs that give clients a competitive edge. Yet they're also businesses, which mean they must be equally concerned about things like productivity and profitability.

Successful industrial design firms get their products noticed, and they do this through the right mix of innovation, cool, and appeal. While doing that, they're also balancing other product requirements such as strength versus weight, optimal space utilization, manufacturing costs, and so on. In the process of juggling these sometimes conflicting demands, ID firms must keep in mind that they've also got a business to run. Like other businesses, ID firms must find ways to get more done in less time while ensuring that quality doesn't suffer when they speed up processes. Operations must be lean and efficient, without risking customer satisfaction. While ID firms may be focused on style, they must keep an eye on their own productivity and profitability as well.

Many ID firms around the world have turned to 2D and 3D digital design and styling software to help meet the business challenges they face. Choose the right software and it can become more than just a design tool. It can provide for a seamless design-through-manufacture process in which downstream issues are considered upfront.

The right software can help ID firms meet tight deadlines without sacrificing quality. It can help them work more profitability, while giving clients a higher level of service. It can even help win new accounts. But not all ID software is created equal; many solutions are standalone while others are integrated with product design, engineering, simulation and manufacturing. When software such as this is applied well, it can help firms win at the business of industrial design.

Impressive proposals boost effectiveness of client meetings

A company has only one chance to make a good first impression. Because a vital part of the industrial design business is winning new accounts, it really matters how a firm is perceived in early client meetings. Hugo Smid, chief designer at sMIdESIGN cvba in Antwerp, Belgium, finds that telling prospective clients his company uses NX™ industrial design and styling software from UGS is an excellent starting point. "Having this software is a big advantage in a first conversation with a potential client," Smid says. "It gives us a professional image."

Smid and colleagues use the software from the earliest stages of product conception, and present 3D digital models in early client meetings. "Five years ago we did the ideation phase with pencil and paper and old-school markers," Smid explains. "But thanks to the performance of the software, we now generate quick design ideas on the computer so what we show to clients early is 3D data." That data can take many forms - simple images, photorealistic renderings, even animations. "The benefit is better communication of the concept," says Smid. "It is much more effective than paper drawings."

Robert Henshaw, a partner at Formation Design Group in Atlanta, Georgia, uses his digital industrial design solution, also UGS' NX, to take early client presentations to a completely new level. On a recent project in which he and his colleagues were asked to update the design of a lift (pallet) truck, the 3D digital images they created in NX not only gave the client, Crown Equipment Corp., an excellent idea of the different design concepts; the images also conveyed workable ideas.

"Because we were modeling the truck's exterior around the internal assembly model supplied by Crown, we knew that any concepts we came up with were feasible," says Henshaw. "That's different from coming up with concepts in a stand-alone ID program where you have to go back and validate them. When we met with the client, we were showing them options that didn't need additional validation to prove that they fit." This level of confidence in the digital model helps later on, too, reducing the number of physical prototypes needed.

Working digitally can give early client presentations a more sophisticated look and feel as well. When sMIdESIGN was asked to design a line of commercial refrigerators and coolers, the firm created an image of a typical grocery store interior using NX's photorealistic imaging capabilities. With a picture of the store as a backdrop, they were able to show the various design concepts as they would look in a typical retail setting. "We did this to present the product proposals, and it was very effective," Smid says. For another project, sMIdESIGN presented Beverage Partners Worldwide with 12 beautifully rendered images of different ice tray concepts. sMIdESIGN went all out, using high-end visualization features such as transparency to make something as seemingly simple as an ice-cube tray look spectacular. Some viewers thought the image was a photograph; it was that realistic-looking.

Working quickly but without compromise

For an industrial design firm, one of its most critical tasks is achieving creativity and uniqueness while working within a client's tight timeframes. "Time to market is certainly an issue for my clients," says Smid. "There's external pressure from clients to do a job quickly," adds Henshaw. "But from an internal standpoint, we want to do a great job. That's the challenge."

Industrial designers mention two different aspects of achieving optimal product designs. First, they must be able to freely express their creativity. These days, when nearly everything, including industrial machinery, incorporates aesthetically pleasing shapes, it's critical that design software doesn't limit a design in this respect. The software must be capable of modeling highly complex curves and surfaces. Just as importantly, it must allow for the fine-tuning of these shapes with a high degree of precision. Shonan Design, of Sagamihara in the Kanagawa prefecture of Japan, finds NX software outstanding in this regard. "Compared to other software, NX is superb in allowing the designers to come up with the shapes they are looking for, and for making very minute modifications," says Kazuki Kamata, a director at Shonan Design.

The second aspect of optimal product design involves the ability to work fast enough to explore a variety of different design options. This is where working digitally offers a huge advantage. It permits what Henshaw refers to as an "Edisonian" approach to product development. "We don't want to get stuck going down one design path," Henshaw explains. "We'd rather evolve or hone the design by creating many different iterations until we reach the optimal solution."

When Henshaw refers to many different iterations, he doesn't mean only digital models. An iteration at his company might be carried all the way to the physical model stage. The company's digital development process permits time for this. "When you develop virtual models, you're just one click away from having a file format that can be generated the next day as an SLA prototype," Henshaw adds. "Or you can have a part CNC machined. With ID-focused tools like NX, the physical models are already there as you build the computer model."

Connecting to mechanical design

For ID firms that work digitally, CAD data from the client often forms the basis for a design, such as when a cover is designed for an underlying mechanical or electronic assembly. Importing CAD data provides the ability to offer a higher level of service to the client. "Good industrial design isn't just shelling something that's already there," says Phil Palermo, a partner at Formation Design. "In some projects it also involves looking for opportunities to rearrange components. That's something we can do because of the software we chose. NX's mechanical design capabilities allow us to rearrange components while its industrial design capabilities are used to shape the outer surfaces."

All too often, there is a disconnect between industrial design and mechanical design. Formation Design uses NX to make that connection. "Generally, NX is very good at importing data," says Henshaw. "It is very capable, even with large files." On the pallet truck project, Formation began the design by working directly with Crown's CAD file of an existing vehicle. Because the file was in NX format, Formation was able to use the information without translation. "It was an assembly file with thousands of components," explains Henshaw. "By not requiring translation to a neutral data format, which you would need with most ID software, we saved a lot of time right there." This is a good example of "lean design," the ability to respond quickly to the customer's request while eliminating waste in the product development process - a win-win situation for Crown and Formation Design.

The other part of connecting to mechanical design is providing digital data that clients can use in downstream applications. "What our clients are paying us for is a product design, not fancy renderings and animations, although we do provide these things on the way to the end design solution," says Henshaw. "Clients want data they can immediately use in their next steps because they're all looking for faster time to market." This can include solid and surface models that will form the basis for mold designs and CNC machining instructions. In addition, we also provide QuickTime VR files that include the materials, textures and photorealistic shadows right out of NX. Our clients can rotate and view the product in real time on-screen. These files have even been used in our client's electronic product literature via CD-ROMs and websites."

Exporting high-quality surfaces worldwide

When data is to be used by the client in manufacturing applications, it is crucial that the ID firm delivers surface data that is "water tight" and accurate. "Historically the more aesthetically pleasing the surface, the more difficult it has been to define it accurately with CAD," explains Henshaw. "But NX has done a great job of integrating tools that allow you to accurately define aesthetic surfaces. The geometry you create in NX is completely usable downstream for manufacturing."

One company that stakes its reputation on its ability to create manufacturable surfaces of the highest quality for downstream use by clients is Design Club International (DCI) of Hakone in the Kanagawa prefecture of Japan. This consultancy takes on both automotive and non-automotive projects, but it is probably best known for exporting automotive designs to customers in China, Korea, France and Italy.

DCI's design process uses clay models in the conceptual design phase. When it is time to create the digital data that will form the basis for the clients' downstream processes, DCI turns to NX. Clay models are scanned and the point cloud data is imported into NX where engineers create Class A (exterior vehicle) surfaces that will be sent to the clients. Concepts are usually finalized by the time the point cloud data is imported, but occasionally minor modifications are made to the digital shape. Like its sister company, Shonan Design, DCI finds NX to be well-suited for the kind of minute surface alterations that are needed at this stage. According to Masaki Kurihara, senior managing director at DCI, "We send NX data to clients all over the world." The firm's clients import the data into a variety of CAD systems. Frequently the system is CATIA. When that is the case, DCI uses a translator to convert the NX data into CATIA format and finds that this process works well. Accuracy and quality are maintained and no rework is required.

Ensuring client satisfaction

The business of industrial design is evolving to the point where clients now expect digital deliverables. "That's one reason I bought high-end software," says Smid. "Even when my company was small, we had to be able to deliver everything a client asked for, including high-quality 3D data." Henshaw of Formation Design believes that delivering digital data makes good sense. "We're already developing these virtual designs so it doesn't make sense to give clients just a picture when they can have the data to perform downstream operations," he says. "That frees their engineers from having to recreate the design, and it ensures that everything fits. They still need to add some elements like fasteners and make drawings, but our ability to deliver manufacturable data takes a huge load off the client and helps them get products to market sooner, with the level of quality they require. It also ensures design intent."

For many ID firms, NX industrial design and styling software has become the foundation on which they are building successful businesses. This software supports the initiatives that are on every ID business' mind, such as getting results quickly without wasting valuable time in activities (data transfer, data clean-up, rebuilding when change occurs, and so on) that don't contribute to the end result and bottom line. NX gives ID firms the tools they need to create aesthetically pleasing, optimized designs -- at the highest level of quality -- that clients can use directly in downstream applications. By working this way, these firms are not only helping themselves. They are also helping their clients get exciting new products to market ahead of the competition. Using NX industrial design and styling software from UGS is a win-win situation for all.

August 2005 Main Page