SDRC...WHAT IS IT?

Does any body know what kind of CAD program
SDRC is?

 

Years ago before Windows, SolidWorks, and SolidEdge came out there were some
rather high end CAD products that many designers were using. Prices were
typically $20K to $50K per seat which did not include the hardware that they
ran on. Most of them allowed a combination of solid modeling, surface
modeling and wireframe modeling. Some people in the business called these
products the "Big 5". Included were SDRC, Pro Engineer, Computervision,
Unigraphics and Catia. Pro Engineer, Unigraphics, and Catia still exist
today as products. Computervision in 1998 was purchased by Pro Engineer and
SDRC about two years or so ago was purchased by the company that owns
Unigraphics. SDRC has pretty much gone away as a product and is in the final
stages of being blended into a line of products that includes Unigraphics.
Ford in North America was probably the most known large user of SDRC.

 

Thank you! I appreciate the knowledgable
answer.

 

A big reason EDS bought SDRC was because of their PDM product,
Metaphase. Metaphase is a huge resourse vacuum to implement and
maintain, which is in line with EDS strategy. Metaphase, I-DEAS, and
the rest of the CAD related software was purchased by EDS. If I
remember right, SDRC's vibrational and test software was purchased by
MTS.

Most of the developers and sales people from SDRC have left/let go and
are now working on other CAD companies or 3rd party applications. You
can see the infulence in some of the mid market programs that came
from I-DEAS.

Joe Bartels

 

Also, folded into SDRC at one point was the popular cam package SmartCam
which was originally developed by some company I can't
remember....Camnetics or something.

 

A company has bought the rights to the SmartCam code here is the link:
http://www.smartcamcnc.com/index.asp

 

I think that is very good news. IIRC SmartCAM was originally privately owned
and then bought by CAMEX who also offered CAMAND as a high end package. When
SDRC bought CAMEX, the plan was to kill SmartCAM and then merge the
functionality of CAMAND into SDRC's existing package which was called
Generative Machining and was fully integrated into the solid modeling
package (I-DEAS). They put SmartCAM on life support and offered users a
package which teamed their scaled down solid modeler, Artisan, with a low
end version of Generative Machining.

Many or most SmartCAM customers found this unacceptable because the
substitute program was cumbersome and lacked much of the elegant
capabilities that they were used to. It would surprise if the majority of
people who this was pushed upon don't still use SmartCAM unless they
switched to a different company's product. Anyway, the point is that I bet
there are a lot of SmartCAM owners who are very stoked to see this
resurrection.

JJ

 

The thing that bothers me most about EDS is a recent press release that
talked about the new chain of command and the direction of the company. I
do not have the entire article but did manage to keep this:

Sometime in Oct 2003: EDS announced it will refocus itself on its core
business - IT outsourcing, and stated it wants to sell a significant portion
of its UGS PLM division which includes (Unigraphics NX, I-DEAS, Nastran NX
and the ParaSolidS Kernel).

The big thing that concerns me would be what will happen to the ParaSolids
Kerneal as SolidWorks uses it.....

 

Anyway, the point is that I bet

Yes JJ!

Absolutely awesome. I used smartcam for a six year stint as the
implemeter and "guru" (yes I did wear a robe and sandals) and loved
it. It was a great program.

I always viewed SDRC as the people who killed smartcam, or at least
dealt it it's coup-de-grace. It sounds like these new people might do
something useful with it again. We ended up looking seariously at
mastercam after the SDRC takeover, complete with its late 1980's
interface - the strenth of which was in its CNC programming ability
(like smartcam) and not some add-on-milling-wannabe-module.

Usually when I hear of an "add-on" module for CAM programming, it
means that some dilettante wants to didle with software because they
think they can make a buck. I liked SmartCAM - it was really good
stuff.

Later -

SMA

 

I'll bet SDRC's icing of SmartCAM was a HUGE boost to MasterCAM and other
products in that marketspace.

JJ