Click on the advert above to visit the company web site

Product category: 3D CAD software
News Release from: PTC - Parametric Technology (UK) | Subject: Pro/Concept
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial Team on 04 November 2002

Industry first for product brainstorming
tool

Pro/Concept is the latest member of the Pro/Engineer family of product design and development software solutions.

Pro/Concept is the latest member of the Pro/Engineer family of product design and development software solutions Pro/Concept is a stand-alone product from PTC that allows designers to capture, explore and develop product designs and create hyper-realistic digital products quickly and inexpensively

It is the first software product to combine the disciplines of sketching and modelling into a single, easy-to-learn and use environment.

Pro/Concept contains tools for free-form sketching, image retouching, curve and facet modelling, painting directly onto three-dimensional (3D) models, and real-time and photorealistic rendering.

As more companies understand the importance of the connection between the products they produce and their overall growth and profitability, the product development process is receiving much closer scrutiny and increasing levels of optimisation.

In particular, the earliest portion of the process - product conceptualisation - can have a great impact on potential success.

With Pro/Concept, designers can create numerous iterations of products in digital form and share them electronically across the "digital value chain" of suppliers, partners, customers -anyone with input into the overall product development process.

By iterating the product at this early stage of development, designers can ensure that there are far fewer changes during the development of the physical product, when such changes can slow time-to-market and add significant expense to the process.

"Designers have traditionally brought product concepts to life through a number of different media - on paper, in clay or wood - but those approaches are often costly, time-consuming and difficult to share externally", said Jim Heppelmann, Chief Technology Officer, PTC.

"During the conceptual phase of creating a new product, you have the ability to quickly and easily distil all your ideas, make assessments and seamlessly move the best ideas on to detailed design and engineering and, ultimately, into production.

Pro/Concept was developed with this reality in mind".

Pro/Concept allows designers to connect with other applications and participants in the design process.

It integrates with multiple CAD tools, including PTC's market leading Pro/Engineer, allowing engineers to reuse all Pro/Concept information, preserving the aesthetic intent, and easing further engineering and production design work.

Pro/Concept integration with PTC Windchill-based solutions allows users to easily collaborate with customers, partners and other team members.

Moen Incorporated, one of the world's largest producers of residential and commercial plumbing products, has been involved in the beta testing of Pro/Concept, helping to determine its range of functionality in the industrial design realm.

"The functionality demonstrated to date shows immense promise in providing industrial designers with a tool that rapidly captures the theme of the proposed product through 2D sketches, 3D models, renderings and rapid prototypes, whether they be generated internally or externally", said Mike Brattoli, Senior Product Designer, Moen.

"Moen is very excited about the potential of this new solution".

Sun Microsystems has been actively involved in the planning and design of Pro/Concept.

"The integrated sketching and modelling found in Pro/Concept give more flexibility to our designers", said Drew Tosh, industrial design lead at Sun.

"The ability to hold design reviews across our intranet will enhance our dispersed teams, making them more efficient and driving the product development process at an even quicker pace".

PTC worked closely with industrial and conceptual designers to define a complete conceptual tool that not only captures new ideas but also allows for the freedom to easily explore and expand them into real working designs as quickly and seamlessly as possible.

With Pro/Concept, users can: sketch, model and paint, including creating sketches using a full palette of tools, creating and editing 3D facet models, and creating curve layouts; provide photorealistic visualisation including the ability to retouch images and photographs, real time rendering, photo-rendering and advanced photo-rendering; and transfer models to and from MCAD and collaboration systems.

Pro/Concept can export file types in a variety of formats (Pro/Engineer, STL, VRML, Product View, OBJ, TIFF or JPEG.) 3D print and stereo lithography provide the ability to produce rapid prototypes.

These capabilities are available in one low cost package that includes self-paced tutorials.

Pro/Concept is available immediately and starts at US $1495.

(Updated by CR, May 2007).

• PTC - Parametric Technology (UK): contact details and other news
• Email this article to a colleague
• Register for the free Engineeringtalk email newsletter
• Engineeringtalk Home Page

Search the Pro-Talk network of sites

Put your news on Engineeringtalk  |   Advertise  |   Get the free Engineeringtalk newsletter  |   Engineeringtalk Home
About Engineeringtalk  |   Copyright © 2000-2008 Pro-Talk Ltd, UK