India has produces world’s largest number of movie productions in any calendar year. India is the only country which celebrates new year’s of more than 11 different communities. While, 1st movie to enter Oscar nomination was “Mother India”

Bollywood movies are visual retreat and movies were done at every possible romantic flick in pre industrialization era, the industrialization of bollywood had turned each movie production as New Product Development (NPD) exercise from script to detailed location and frame by frame screen play.

The evolutionary change in audience expectation is addressed by bollywood in true democratic sense, now it is critical for movies to capture audience imagination within short period “every romantic flick is not a success formula”!

Industrialisation of bollywood provided benefits like movies on biopic of a sport person, new comers creating blockbusters, small movies make a good business. This transition brought shift in the perception of the business. Gone are the days when movies were assessed based on number of weeks it sustained – 52 week, 25 weeks, Silver jubilee, Golden jubilee. Today it all boils down to the business a movie does – which movie entered the 100 crore club is all that it matters. With entry of multiplexes, mobile aps and social networking movie making is an NPD than an craftsmanship. The audience is now well informed before making a choice to view the movie, they are informed on the script writer, director and other credentials based on which they decide to invest time and money.

India’s best NPD mission “MOM”, Mr.Arunan the architect of this mission is known to millions of Indians due to 24/7 media and emergence of social networking.

Major similarities of movie making with NPD

Script (cad and cae): Bollywood have moved away from melodrama scripts to inspirational, motivational scripts. Any NPD requires exhaustive research on concepts and specialization in each segment. Organizations define their scope with technology in mind than vice versa. Earlier it used to be design based cae now its CAE based cad.

The entry of price point based products wherein companies no longer accept isolated CAD/CAM/CAE products since technology plays important role in keeping the product in market. It is similar to how the scripts are written keeping an actor in mind and actors who also train themselves to fit into the role.

The NPD on mobiles and smart phones which results in a new mobile entering the market week on week is more or less like tv soap which come with twist and turns in every episode. NPD across categories making the product which are cae based cad; the material to make the product takes precedence over looking for material to justify the design. This specialization is found at bollywood as well, no single lyrics writer take on full movie, no leading actor does 3 films a year.

Screenplay (functional design/prototype): The rich movie experience is always due to screenplay, so the editor has to make the right choices to cut or to paste or to reshoot. In NPD functional design takes highest point of reference to make a product successful. The life span of a products is coming down at faster rate with it the used product market is expanding at far more higher rate due to new market places like ecommerce portals and companies offering exchange schemes to keep the customer bonded with the brand.

Security (background music): Every thriller movie is a success when relevant and apt background music is present since mind reacts more to sound than image. NPD is in highly competitive environment every aspect of data security plays major roles as it involves large community of employees, suppliers, service providers, technology and new monster(s) to tackle BYOD and social networking.

Reality shows (Price): Most of production houses run their awareness campaign at reality shows on television, optimum utilization of internet and mobile apps have made the black marketing of movie tickets as ancient history. At NPD products are categorized and promoted at price point market than user preference market.

Marketing(PLM/SLM): The life span of movie is down to few weeks, so the marketing of the movie across the available publicity spectrum

takes the highest importance for the success. The production houses plans the marketing activity at the conceptual stage itself. Television networks have provided 2nd round of monetization for each movie, as movies run on TV channels post euphoria at multiplexes. NPD also faces the same situation as social networking and mobile apps are fastest way to reach the buyer for success. No NPD will be successful without right PLM/SLM in place since isolation can not keep customer engaged. A well implemented PLM and SLM de risks the product from being a copy cats products at market place and to get respectable market share for NPD efforts

Item songs (after sales support): Every bollywood movie showcases 1 song and dance extravaganza as item song, but that sometimes becomes an USP and comes with an high cost. Most of times item song(s) have decided successes of a movie. NPD market looks at warranty and guarantee which decides the engagement with customer. These aspects contribute to keep after market segment intact and facilitate used product market to expand.

Game changer for bollywood was the emergence of multiplexes which existed with shopping malls where customer has the delight of shopping with entertainment and food as well ! Is 3Dprinting game changer at NPD, consumers are in for a delight “bollywoodishtyle”

CAD/CAM technology has been catering to the industry since the late 1990s. Initially companies were hesitant to adopt these technologies and perceived them to be a tool that only big MNCs could afford. However, the perception has changed now. Today there is more awareness about these technologies and the value they add in robust product design engineering and manufacturing processes. Hence, these tools have become extremely popular, even among the SMEs and are no more looked at as a luxury for the MNCs.

Today most of the companies that are into product design and engineering have atleast a basic CAD set-up in house that facilitates them to either create or make modifications in the product design. Hence, 3D modelling software is very easily found in the R&D labs of SMEs as well. However, CAE is still trying to make its way into the market. Although the awareness of this technology is fast being comprehended by the industry, but is not yet very widely used. The fact that these tools require trained manpower and slightly higher R&D budget acts as a drawback when it comes to some SMEs. But for limited usage, they can always outsource and avail the services of an engineering services partner.

Rapid prototyping technology that is critical in physical product design validation is also witnessing demand in the Indian engineering industry. It helps designers identify functional and ergonomic errors which can go unnoticed in the virtual product design simulation. But again, because these technologies are little hard on R&D budgets, SMEs need to think twice about making them a part of their R&D set-ups. But as the Indian industry realises the fact that adopting latest technology will help them fight the growing competition and deliver good quality work in lesser time and costs, these technologies have now become a necessity rather than just ‘good to have’.

Challenges in CAD/CAM industry
Availability of trained man power is one of the biggest challenges in this industry. Engineering students are exposed to very basic and preliminary understanding of the CAD and CAE software functionalities and feature and lack the understanding of how they can apply this knowledge when exposed to the industry. There is a shortage of people possessing relevant, in-depth and holistic understanding of these technologies and their application. Companies hence have to invest lot of time, money and resources in making them job ready. This slows down the productivity.

Another challenge is the traditional mindset and reluctance or aversion to adopt the technology due to the fear of having to learn how to operate it, or maybe because they are threatened that technology will become indispensible and render them expendable.
The costs involved in adopting these technologies also poses as a challenge. All the premium, and high end technological solutions are expensive and sometimes the SMEs do not have that high a budget required to invest in that level of infrastructure development.

Latest developments and offerings in CAD/CAM/CAE and PLM technologies are:

Direct Digital Manufacturing: This high end rapid prototyping technology from Stratasys enables designers to create complex parts/products using FDM (Fused Deposition Modelling) technology, that can be used as products for end use. FDM technology has been patented by Stratasys. If a company does not have to mass manufacture a product, but still needs to create an equally good quality product for end use, they can use this machine to create it. FDM can help manufacture organically shaped tools, jigs, check gauges and fixtures for assembly processes.

Digital Manufacturing Solutions: This software tool enables companies to virtually create production plant simulations that best
optimises and configures work flows, assembly lines, robotics and even considers ergonomics. This reduces time and material wastage to a great extent as well. Ergonomics study also helps incorporate necessary safety requirements and maintain healthy standard of working conditions in the production facilities. It can be used to design plants right from the start, or can be even used to modify designs of the existing plants. This technology is fast catching up in the manufacturing industry

PLM: Product lifecycle management in its wide purview includes all the process and stages that go into product development, right from product designing, simulation and analysis, to production by configuring optimised workflows and processes that can shorten design and development cycle; reduce time, material and cost wastage; and thus enhance overall efficiency and effectiveness of the product design and development department.

Product Design Optimisation: There are certain tools in the market that facilitate designers to optimise product design in such a way, that it reduces the weight of the product, yet enhances its strength. It basically highlights the areas in product design that might contain excess material and removal of which might not compromise on the quality of the product, and at the same time, if applicable, might even highlight the areas in the design which might use some material which can enhance the strength of the product. It basically reduces on the consumption of the material and ensures that the material is being added in the right areas in right quantities where it is utmost essential to retain the desired quality and strength of the product. It drastically enhances the product design and functional quality and robustness.

Market Scenario
Various surveys, studies and reports have indicated that Engineering Services in India is going to grow manifolds in the years to come. It might make India a global R&D centre for many companies and even the outsourcing of engineering services to India will go up. This has brought CAD/CAM industry into big prominence and limelight.

Many companies are making the most of this opportunity and investing in building the necessary infrastructure to support, match, augment and benefit from this growth. e.g. there will be a rise the demand of trained manpower in CAD/CAM and CAE technology, which will significantly increase job opportunities in the country and hence resulted into the rise of CAD/CAM/CAE training centres. Students should take a wise decision of selecting a centre by thoroughly checking the quality of courseware, teaching methodology, recognition in the market etc. This will also increase employment opportunities in the country and students who read this trend early and prepare themselves accordingly will benefit.

Also there is a rise of companies providing engineering services. Various CAD/CAM/CAE and PLM technology vendors and developers are flooding the markets, giving consumer companies wide range of choice and options to choose from after carefully evaluating their needs and requirements and matching them with the software that can best support their engineering initiatives.

Just like the IT boom, product engineering might just be the next big thing.

About AUthor

Sanjay Daga, Executive VP – Sales, DesignTech Systems Ltd
PS: Image courtesy have been mentioned with the images

World’s biggest democratic carnival will be on this summer with the largest secular democratic country ‘India’ going to elections. The 2014 carnival is already an ideal package of infotainment due to the emergence and popularity of 24/7 news channels, and social networking sites. Unprecedented growth of smart phones in this market has made every news and events available to Aam Aadmi (common man).

The last 3 central governments were successful coalition governments completing 15 years of coalition governance in Indian democratic history. It seems the Indian politics moved away from bipolar, tripolar, quadripolar fight forever.

Coalition governments are here to stay and every one has started to accept this change. One must be thinking how is this related to the industry we are in. Well, has the Coalition era begun in software product Market? partially, the coalition dynamics are becoming more relevant and visible in CAD for tooling segment. The electorate in CAD for tooling segment ie customers are having multiple CAD software’s in their IT assets along with manpower having multiple skill sets. Certain products have been able to establish niche market leadership at select verticals.

The emergence of independent CAD for tooling and ISV (Independent software vendors) products unfurled the coalition era across the 3DCAD system in MCAD. Few of ISV products have converted the unique domain functionalities into software features and at certain geographies ISV products have larger recognition and brand recall than the OEMs.

The CAD for tooling ISV solutions has got peer club with electrical, plant solutions, PDM, civil, architectural and cabling solutions to name a few.

CAD for tooling products comes at the last stage of NPD (New Product Development) but takes the first line of fire. These tools propagate the automation, hence reducing human intervention on redundant tasks. The fundamental question that arises here is – does the product actually do what it propagates or is it just a talking point similar to coalition politics ‘ playing to the gallery (i.e media)’.

The product needs to exist in multi and diverse IT environments. The market leadership will be with products which adhere to coalition realities. Following are some of the coalition compulsions (readers can substitute them with regional parties, national parties, article 370, common minimum program, corporate funding, Women’s reservation or any other terms of current politics):-

ERP/SCM (Supply Chain Management) – ERP’s exist with every organisation in one or the other form. The changes in CAD bring direct impact on BOM (Bill of Material). The product needs to provide options to integrate with ERP / SCM solutions with the least investment than providing flashy reports to generate quotes or RFP’s/RFQ’s and parking customer’s critical data at islands which is not integrated with any of enterprise applications.

PDM (Product Data Management) – CAD for tooling is either recipient or creator of most of the critical NPD data. The CAD data needs to be integrated with leading PDM tools, this will help customer to attain ROI rather than few automation features which just aim to reduce the number of mouse clicks.

ESP (Engineering Service Provider) – The popularity of the product with ESP’s will help the customers avail the on demand expertise during business crisis.

Product Ambassadors – Special category of people, who come with domain expertise coupled with software expertise, are known in the market as domain consultants or subject matter experts. These people enable the customers to train their employees at optimum price and nearest geography so, that customers get optimum ROI from the same set of employees.

CAE (Computer Aided Engineering) – No NPD is possible without using relevant CAE solutions. The CAD for tooling solution needs to provide direct CAD translations with leading CAE tools. This will help the customers to enhance their offerings and protect the IP.

Compliance- The product should adhere to compliance requirements of the industry. Customers cannot afford to have multiple solutions to manage the similar compliance requirements and complicating the entire process.

CAD partners or resellers- The products have acquired market share and dominance , only when their partners have become successful.

The product which shows disrespect to coalition dharma may remain like the communist ideology in a capitalist democratic country. Customers now seem to be waiting for disrupting technology to bring in a different perspective like the much talked about Aam Admi phenomena.

Disclaimer: Views expressed above are the author’s own.

How has CAD/CAM evolved with the growing demand for speed and productivity?
CAD/CAM technology evolution and its demand in India have come a long way. The technology made its way into the Indian market in the late 90s. In those days, these software’s were considered to be suitable for the MNCs who could afford them. They were expensive not just infrastructural set-up wise, but training adequate number of employees to use these software was also not possible for many, hence were expensive for the SMEs.

Apart from this, moving from the conventional and strongly trusted drawing board methods of product designing also took efforts and time. Companies like DeisgnTech have invested lot of efforts in making the SMEs aware of these technologies and the benefits they offer. With time, the popularity of the CAD/CAM/CAE software has grown and is widely adopted by SME’s across India.

The SMEs understood the benefits that these software’s can provide in terms of robust and aesthetically appealing product development in lesser times and costs.

Please share  some of the latest technology developments…
Advanced rapid prototyping machines, for example, offering from Stratasys known as DDM (Direct Digital manufacturing) that enables you to create parts that can be used for the end use; Digital manufacturing solutions that help companies carry out plant design activities by configuring ideal workflow for better through put, advanced 3D CAD and CAE technologies that promise around 95-98% accuracy in product design simulation and analysis are some of the latest technologies that have taken the industry by storm.

What are your views on awareness of Indian SMEs in terms of automation? What are the challenges you face dealing with the industry?
Large number of Indian SMEs are not yet ready to accept automation solutions. They have access to low cost manpower and prefer to depend on them. The major challenge while dealing with SMEs is the initial cost of automation and maintenance. Many SMEs are hard pressed for funds and cannot afford such investments.

What sort of demands do you see in the CAD/CAM industry, particularly in India?
Indian CAD/CAM industry is growing steadily. CAE, PLM and Digital Manufacturing solutions are gaining ground and this is contributing to the overall growth of this segment. With various MNCs having put up their captive R&D and design centers in India, it has resulted in the increasing usage of CAD/CAE/PLM as well as with their vendors. We expect this trend to continue in the next few years.

What are the emerging sectors for CAD/CAM solution providers?
CAD/CAM products were typically used for areas like mechanical engineering and consumer product development, but today the use of these products have increased drastically. Medical is one such emerging sector which has huge opportunity for CAD/CAM solution providers. From dental to knee cap replacement and modern medical equipment CAD/CAM is used in many applications. Dental labs have started using prototyping machines to create a prototype of dentures; also doctors have started using this technology for knee surgeries where they create a prototype of a knee cap to check if it fits well.

Another sector, though is not new but is emerging in big way is education. Today many engineering colleges and institutes are augmenting their infrastructural investments to train the students on latest technologies which include CAD/CAM.

What kind of solutions are the customers looking for?
Customers are looking for solutions which can help them retain their product design knowledge, reduce product design costs and product development cycle time. They expect good technology and product support from the vendor and wish to have lower cost of ownership.

How was 2013 for Designtech? What were the challenges faced and what are your expectations from 2014?
Due to the economic downturn and shrinking industrial output, the first few months of 2013 posed as quite a challenge. However, the market started showing some sign of revival towards the end and hence companies like ours, whose business is directly dependent on how OEMs flare and perform found new hope and opportunities.

We were not sure to meet our expectations in numbers and better our turnover when compared to that of the previous year, but we hope the coming months will be much better. The situation does not look as bleak and dim as it earlier appeared to be. We are expecting the trend of second half of 2013 to continue in 2014 as well. Though at a slow rate, the economy is expected to improve.

Future plan for the Indian market?
Our future plan for the Indian Market includes setting up of CAD Academy Network across India. We have already commenced working on the same. We have 3 centers active and going strong in Pune and Gurgaon. DesignTech CAD Academy, the education wing of DesignTech is an authorised training partner of Siemens for their CAD and Altair for their CAE suite of solutions and we provide training on their licensed software through certified trainers.

We also wish to pioneer the use of Digital Manufacturing and PLM solutions amongst the SME segment in India by offering them quick and result oriented implementation so that they can become globally competitive.

nishant@mfgtechupdate.com