BENCHmark July 2008
Who will provide the simulation engineers of tomorrow?
 NAFEMS aims to keep its ear close to the ground, and to listen out
for messages that are becoming widespread. In recent years, at many
events where CAE professionals are gathered together, a particular
message has been starting to resonate more and more loudly: from
many different sources, we are frequently being told
“we’re struggling to recruit good engineers to do our
simulation”.
To make matters worse, many of the high value engineers who have
spent most of their career are now approaching retirement.
At the same time, there seems to be unanimous agreement amongst
industry pundits that the market for CAE continues to enjoy double
digit growth. To be sustainable, this growth needs to be matched be
an increase in the pool of engineers that can perform simulation.
New generations of software designed to be used by engineers that
are not full-time analysts goes some way towards alleviating this.
But vendors have recognised that the shortage of suitably qualified
and experienced staff is a key factor that threatens to limit the
future growth of the market for simulation.
Unless universities and other educational establishments can start
to feed through a significantly increased supply of new engineers
(and unfortunately the reverse appears to be the case in some
regions) the problem is only going to get worse in the future. With
annual outputs of 25,000 engineers in the UK and 60,000 in the US
being dwarfed by the 450,000 graduating from Indian engineering
colleges, it is little wonder that so many large engineering
companies are turning to India.
In fact, the offshoring of engineering services presents a $40
billion opportunity for the Indian economy by 2020, according to a
study released by National Association of Software and Service
Companies (NASSCOM). This trend is no longer being driven solely by
the desire to drive down costs, but rather the availability of
suitable manpower resources.
Even assuming that, by embracing a global approach such as this,
sufficient engineering graduates can be tempted to take up a
rewarding career in simulation (as opposed to the more lucrative
but arguably less rewarding careers in finance, IT etc which have
an equal thirst for capable and numerate graduates) they then need
to gain appropriate and effective training and experience.
NAFEMS believes that, to be a highly competent engineering
simulation professional, an engineering graduate should obtain:
Training in background theory to underpin the engineering
application of numerical analysis
Familiarity with, and appreciation of, the limitations of the
particular software employed
Numerical analysis experience - that is relevant experience in the
specification, planning, execution and interpretation of numerical
analysis applied to design, simulation or product verification
Understanding of the engineering aspects relevant to the particular
products that are being worked upon
As we work our way down this list, the emphasis generally shifts
from formal or semi-formal training to “on-the-job”
training and experience. For an individual, obtaining this
experience in any form of structured and efficient way proves to be
very difficult. From the perspective of an employer, judging the
quality of the experience gained is easier said than done.
 There are no easy answers, but it should be recognised that NAFEMS
is working hard to understand the different issues and formulate
ideas for how it can offer some assistance.
Tim Morris, Chief Executive
July 2008
Articles are available for NAFEMS Members to download
below
. You will need to login on the right to access these
files.
Knowledge Base 020
The CAE Guy 003
Complexity Management: New Perspectives and Challenges for CAE in
the 21st Century
The problem of managing complexity in the CAE process.
The International Congress on Simulation Technology for the
Engineering Analysis Community moves to Crete, Greece for 2009.
CFD Mythology
Another take on the common myths of CFD.
The Impact of Multi-Objective Numerical Optimization in Biomedical
Engineering
The application of design of experiments, multiobjective
optimization and robustness analysis technologies.
A Conversation with…
Prof. Ahmed Noor, one of the leading lights in CAE in the aerospace
industry, discusses the future of CAE and NAFEMS’ role in
that future.
Full Issue
If you are not a NAFEMS Member,
click here
to find out how you and your company can benefit from joining the
only independent, international association dedicated to
engineering analysis and simulation.
|
