UGS Launches NX 5 CAD/CAM/CAE Software

UGS today announced Version 5 of NX® software – the next-generation of its digital product development software designed to help companies develop innovative products faster and more cost-efficiently.

NX 5 delivers breakthrough technology innovations to the market, including the highest level of productivity improvements in NX software to date. UGS is supporting the launch with a series of “Greater Powers”- themed marketing events around the world.

“The CAD/CAM/CAE market is core to UGS’ future growth, and NX 5 drives our vision to be the market leader in this strategic segment by setting new standards through key new technologies,” said Tony Affuso, chairman, CEO and president of UGS. “The next generation of PLM solutions must facilitate better decisions across a global supply chain. The marriage of technologies inside NX 5 will dramatically increase the ability of companies to effectively leverage knowledge across their business. That’s why it is core to our PLM vision.”

Major product enhancements

NX 5 incorporates “Greater Powers” breakthrough innovations including:

More flexibility – NX 5 provides companies with “Design Freedom” to work effectively with all legacy data to maximize reuse without redesign. Benchmark results provided 50 percent greater efficiency than other competing systems. In addition, NX 5 cuts through the constraints of parametric models enabling compressed design times and reductions in costly errors.

More coordination – NX 5 introduces Active Mockup to the industry to enable engineers to work more efficiently in the context of a total product. Greater visibility and coordination in extended design reviews enable more design iterations in less time.

More productivity – NX 5 increases workflow productivity through a new user interface and NX “Your Way” customization. Customer benchmark results indicated productivity increases of 20 percent. In addition, a third-party benchmark indicated that NX 5 outperformed all leading competitors in workflow productivity tests.

More strength – NX 5 seamlessly integrates CAD, CAM and CAE into a unified, open environment for increased product and process information efficiency. Customer benchmark results indicated 50 percent faster analysis workflows compared to a leading competitor. In addition, manufacturing machining time is reduced by 20 percent.




“NX 5 enables design for commonization, not just in terms of part reuse and standardization, but more importantly, for knowledge-based engineering methods and best practices through an extremely intuitive user interface across a unified set of industrial design, CAD, CAM and CAE capabilities,” said Dick Slansky, senior analyst, ARC Advisory Group.



“UGS has increased the efficiency of its CAD system through new key features in NX 5,” said Gisela Wilson, director of PLM Applications Program, IDC. “UGS calls these features ‘Design Freedom’ because they free designers from the constraints imposed by history-based or parametric systems. Designers can alter design geometry where it occurs without having to undo the design tree. This is particularly valuable for suppliers who support multiple OEMs with multiple CAD systems.”

Design Freedom technology for more flexibility
NX 5 delivers key “Design Freedom” features to enable companies to develop complex products through an efficient design process. Flexible design tools eliminate constraints imposed by parametric systems. For example, Advanced Selection Intent automatically selects geometry and infers the correct relationship, which allows users to quickly make design changes. The ability to work on geometry without defined features or history adds an important new level of flexibility, enabling changes to be made in minutes that may require hours in other systems.

“UGS’ approach to ‘Design Freedom’ in NX 5 creates flexibility that takes CAD/CAM/CAE to another level of maturity,” said Dr. Ken Versprille, PLM Research Director, CPDA. “One important example, NX 5’s approach provides the flexibility to deal with last-minute design changes due to market shifts and design-for-postponement strategies.”

In addition to flexible design tools, NX 5 embeds the JT™ data format - the PLM industry’s most widely used lightweight 3D data format for product visualization and collaboration - to support files from multiple CAD programs to speed the design process.



NX 5 also improves concurrent design by enabling companies to reduce rework and improve collaboration by creating interfaces to parts, then publishing and managing them in Teamcenter® software, UGS’ industry leading PLM portfolio. By publishing part interfaces, companies can simplify impact analysis, streamline change notifications, and reduce change conflict in concurrent design scenarios by up to 60 percent based on beta customer feedback.

“NX 5’s new assembly constraints capabilities and reuse library, accessed directly from the Teamcenter managed environment, will help us to design our products much faster,” said Gyeongho Moon, C4 Group Manager, LG Electronics. “JT is already a part of our design review and therefore we have strong interest in the new NX 5 Active Mockup. It will save us time through reduced translation efforts and maintained associativity with the NX model.”

Active Mockup for more coordination
NX 5 introduces the industry’s first Active Mockup technology. Active Mockup enables engineers to use one product for instantaneous review of design changes in the full context of their total product.

“UGS is the first PLM vendor to introduce Active Mockup,” adds Versprille. “They have solved a problem that originally required a completely separate application. By eliminating this need, they’ve streamlined the design process, saving customers development time and money.”

“Freedom to innovate combined with JT interoperability, directly addresses the reality of suppliers having to support multiple CAD systems for their OEM clients,” adds Slansky. “NX 5 will enable companies to consolidate their software investments while significantly improving the productivity of engineering resources.”

Active Mockup rapidly modifies model data regardless of its origin and outperforms NX’s nearest competitors. In addition, NX 5’s embedded JT technology delivers five times the graphics performance and reduces memory usage by 70 percent. For Teamcenter/NX users, this enables true configuration-driven variant mockup.

NX “Your Way” and new user interface for more productivity

Workflow productivity is improved in all areas of NX. Customer tests indicate an overall 20 percent productivity improvement with the new innovative user interface. In addition, a third-party benchmark indicated that NX 5 outperformed all leading competitors in workflow productivity tests. Modern redesigned menus and dialogs adhere to the latest standards and they are implemented consistently throughout the software and clearly communicate required input and command steps.

“NX 5 looks cool,” said Paul Philips, staff engineer, Global CAD/CAM Development, Kennametal. “I think UGS has done an excellent job on the new user interface. It’s sure to win over new customers with its professional look and feel, and existing customers should be able to adapt extremely quickly. We’re also looking forward to using the new assembly mating constraints.”

NX’s new user interface also includes enhanced role-specific interfaces, which enable companies to present NX commands appropriate to user function and expertise. This cuts initial training time by as much as 50 percent, based on an independent audit. In addition, increased integration with Teamcenter delivers productivity gains up to 90 percent in common functions such as inserting standard parts.

Open and unified solution for more strength
UGS continues to differentiate its products through an emphasis on openness that is integrated throughout its PLM portfolio. NX 5 unifies data from competitive systems as well as NX’s own CAD/CAM/CAE technologies to speed and streamline product development. In CAE, NX 5 delivers more simulation power and performance than ever before. Recent customer benchmarks demonstrated 10 times faster process time improvements over the nearest competitor.

Web and worldwide launch activities

NX 5 is immediately available. UGS will launch NX 5 around the world, starting with:

EMEA: April 17 at Hannover Fair in Germany.
Americas: April 18 at SAE World Congress in Detroit.
Asia/Pacific: April 19 in Tokyo.
These events will be followed by launch seminars in all major countries. For online product videos and a complete what’s new guide, visit www.ugs.com/nx5