As some of you may know, we at SolidWorks have been active in Rwanda for a number of years. SolidWorks’ founder Jon Hirschtick first heard of Rwandan president Kagame’s vision for improving Rwandan design and manufacturing education from a friend (and SolidWorks customer) in 2005.

Jon and former CEO Jeff Ray initially helped with creating an engineering software program for local technical colleges, including ETO Gitarama, ETO Muhima and the Kigali Institute of Technology (KIST). SolidWorks provided courseware for design and manufacturing, materials that teachers could use in the classroom, models by which students could learn to digitally create products and embark on careers in 3D design and product development.

SolidWorks later joined with the Rwandan government and Innnovate3D (a division of TenLinks) to create Gasabo 3D, a provider of 3D CAD modeling services to global industries. Today Gasabo 3D is also reverse-engineering the parts used in internationally-made farm equipment, allowing Rwandan engineers to quickly fabricate replacement components or entirely new machines in a short period of time.

One of the teams here at Dassault Systemes recently created a short video about our involvement for a film contest hosted by the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship. We encourage you to watch it, and if you’re so inclined, vote for the video to proceed to the next stage of the contest (our video is listed as Dassault Systemes).

Best,

Matt

People & Technology at the heart of Innovation

Mike Demler, Technical Editor — EDN, recently concluded in his article, The design-to-cost imperative and customer value , that ‘Too many companies in “mature” competitive industries blame customers or the tough economy for driving down prices. The lesson from the most successful companies is to continually deliver greater value. Companies should focus more on how their engineers can design for value rather than obsess over balance-sheet-driven cost-cutting strategies, in which layoffs and outsourcing are all too prevalent.’

The focus here is on innovation versus purely cost reduction.  Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) is a significant element to the equation as it impacts not only costs reduction, but more importantly provides the means to deliver top-line growth.  Another more recently and extremely critical element to foster innovation is the move by Dassault Systemes (DS) to tie social innovation with the product development process, also known as PLM2.0 as supported by the DS V6 online platform.

V6 facilitates that connection between “Customer” and “Company” in a LifeLike manner all the way through to the engineering, to which Mike Demler is referring.

Consumer Focus + Technology Leadership + Business Process Agility: these are the drivers for DS in the High-Tech industry as expressed by our customers and that we drive with V6 capabilities.

It’s comforting for me to see that we all share a common vision to place consumers and consumer value at the core.

Cheers!

Dominique

Already as an undergrad in Beirut, Ziad (the real person on the picture) was passionate about manufacturing engineering and member of the Institute of Industrial Engineers student chapter at the Lebanese American University.

Ziad came to France for his graduate studies.  In  September 2010 he defended his Master project at Nancy University.  The project  completed his Dassault Systèmes internship.

Creating a learning lab lifelike avatar  is an old educators’ dream. Lecture virtualization  is a done deal thanks to various  e-learning and recording techniques. But when it comes to a technical experimentation environment, the virtual model should reproduce real-world behavior and react according to learner’s interactions.

Ziad’s project was to virtualize the Nancy learning lab. Here’s a video showing one of his virtual scenarios:

This scene shows a specific use of the lab: no need for a student or an educator to book the real equipment -especially when in use- to test a new idea or mature a project.

Ziad used CATIA V6 and DELMIA Automation V6 to create the “Flexible Production System” lab avatar. He based his model on the real Nancy lab that he used when studying there.

The Nancy lab  is an advanced learning environment shared by many engineering schools.  For example, the lab is part of  a nationwide French consortium in which Dassault Systèmes has always had an active role, the “AIP Primeca”.

Other cool usages :

• Experiential enrollment marketing: Universities can provide engaging lifelike experiences of their learning equipment to any curious candidate student in high school,
• Affordable learning experiences: Educators in under-equipped institutions, especially in developing countries, can teach with learning instruments that are incredibly more engaging than just text books,
• Enhanced learning when in the actual lab: Students can discover and practice in the lab before going there physically. Their time in the real lab is more efficient. The learning process gains efficiency.
• …

Next Step to Involve Mexico

There are currently six worplaces in the lab where students can program their scenario in context. The seventh will be the virtual one, first accessible locally, then from a partnering university in Mexico. Students there will receive credit within a newly created, international, double diploma while programming the avatar lab and testing their 3D-validated program remotely in the real lab.

Following  this project, Dassault Systèmes hired Ziad.  Now he works  in the ENOVIA QA department.

Other learning experiences are available on the DS Education Lab.

Best,

Olivier

Ziad Hachache works in the DS ENOVIA QA department.

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Olivier Ammoun works in the Dassault Systèmes education team.