First up, Altair has released Altair HyperWorks 2026. The developer says its flagship simulation platform is now faster, more intuitive, and more multiphysical.

Altair highlighted six “key innovations” of HyperWorks 2026:

• AI-powered design and simulation: HyperWorks continues to offer Altair PhysicsAI, a tool that uses AI to predict simulation results from historical data. In the 2026 release, Altair has expanded PhysicsAI support for vectors and smoothed-particle hydrodynamics.
• Enterprise-scale pre-processing and model assembly: Altair says large, complex assemblies will load and update “almost instantly” in HyperWorks 2026, and that model building, meshing, and connector creation are also significantly faster.
• Integrated multiphysics simulation: Improved solver performance and domain coupling in HyperWorks 2026 means faster and more accurate multiphysics simulations, according to Altair. In particular, users should notice improvements in motor and system design, reliability testing for electronics and batteries, and electromagnetic simulations.
• Automation, collaboration, and connectivity: HyperWorks 2026 adds more Python and API support and better visualization and plotting tools.
• Realistic particle, fluid, and material behavior: Altair says new modeling approaches in HyperWorks 2026 better capture the behavior of bulk materials, particle interactions, and high-temperature effects.
• Intuitive design and motion exploration: HyperWorks 2026 has new comparison and motion modeling tools that Altair says will make for more flexible design exploration. That includes new implicit modeling and warp-map tools, multi-window analysis for side-by-side comparison of results, and more.

Altair HyperWorks 2026 is now available. You can see more release highlights on Altair.com.

Altair, recall, is now part of the Siemens ONE Tech Company hivemind (speaking of which, anybody else watching Pluribus? You should). Here’s the second simulation update from that Unum.

Siemens launches Simcenter X Advanced

Siemens has announced what it says are significant updates to Simcenter X, the cloud-based version of its simulation suite (anytime you see an X trailing a Siemens software brand, it means it’s the cloud version; occasionally this branding backfires).

Siemens first launched Simcenter X in May 2024. At the time it supported only Simcenter STAR-CCM+, Siemens’ CFD software. The latest update, which Siemens refers to as Simcenter X Advanced, now includes more of Siemens’ simulation portfolio.

In addition to STAR-CCM+, Simcenter X Advanced supports Simcenter Amesim for mechatronic system simulation, Simcenter HEEDS for design exploration and optimization, Simcenter 3D for multidisciplinary simulation, and Simcenter Femap for finite element analysis. Siemens says these applications are tightly integrated in Simcenter X, sharing a single named-user license and common token pool with built-in data management through Teamcenter X (Siemens’ cloud-based PLM software).

“By unifying our multiphysics and optimization technologies and enhancing them with robust data management, collaboration capabilities, AI-driven guidance and design exploration, we’re empowering every engineer to accelerate innovation that matters, reduce complexity and make smarter decisions faster — anytime, anywhere,” Jean-Claude Ercolanelli, senior VP of simulation and test solutions at Siemens Digital Industries Software, said in the press release.

You can read more about Simcenter X in this Siemens blog post about the new update, or this other Siemens blog post about Bear Grylls.

One last link

In last week’s Engineering Paper I wrote about the launch of Comsol Multiphysics 6.4. My colleague Martin Rowe, senior technical editor of EE World Online, provides a few more details in Comsol v6.4 enhances simulations, including electromagnetics.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Simulation spotlight: HyperWorks 2026 and Simcenter X Advanced appeared first on Engineering.com.

You’re reading Engineering Paper, and here’s the latest design and simulation software news.

Nvidia and Synopsys have announced a new strategic partnership that aims to tighten the bond between Nvidia’s computing hardware and Synopsys’ engineering software. As any good strategic partner would, Nvidia has also invested $2 billion in Synopsys common stock.

Naturally, AI is a big part of the new partnership. Nvidia and Synopsys will integrate their respective agentic AI technologies, including Synopsys AgentEngineer, Nvidia NIM microservices, Nvidia NeMo Agent Toolkit and Nvidia Nemotron. Synopsys will further tap into Nvidia’s CUDA-X AI libraries to optimize its simulation software for GPU computing.

The non-exclusive partnership will also include a collaboration on digital twin technologies, a focus on cloud solutions and joint go-to-market initiatives.

“Our partnership with Synopsys harnesses the power of Nvidia accelerated computing and AI to reimagine engineering and design — empowering engineers to invent the extraordinary products that will shape our future,” said Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang in the joint press release.

Synopsys CEO Sassine Ghazi filled out the same mad lib with slightly different words: “Together we will re-engineer engineering and empower innovators everywhere to more efficiently realize their innovations.”

Comsol releases Multiphysics version 6.4

Comsol has released the latest update to its simulation platform, Comsol Multiphysics version 6.4. It comes with new features, expanded capabilities, and major performance improvements, according to Comsol.

Among the version 6.4 updates is GPU support for all physics via Nvidia’s cuDSS direct sparse solver library, which Comsol says can provide substantial speedups compared to CPU-based solvers. The new release also supports multi-GPU acceleration for acoustics simulations, another potential speedup.

Another release highlight is the new Granular Flow Module, which uses the discrete element method to simulate grain and powder systems being mixed or conveyed.

Comsol Multiphysics 6.4 users will also have access to AI-assisted simulation through a chatbot window that now supports connections to OpenAI API-compatible LLMs including GPT-5, DeepSeek, Google Gemini, Anthropic Claude, and more. Comsol says this will enable model-aware assistance that leverages active simulation information along with Comsol documentation.

For a full list of the Multiphysics 6.4 updates, including geometry and meshing enhancements, new capabilities in the Application Builder, and new visualization features, check out the Comsol Multiphysics 6.4 release highlights.

Veni, Vidi, Vinci

A startup called Vinci has emerged from stealth with an AI solution for semiconductor thermal simulation. The company announced $46 million in total funding and boasts that its physics-based AI software runs up to 1000x faster than conventional FEA tools.

Vinci says that its AI foundation model can currently simulate steady-state conduction, transient conduction, and steady-state thermoelasticity.  According to Vinci, the AI software does not require meshing, does not hallucinate (the press release boldly claims “guaranteed accuracy”), and does not require nor train on proprietary customer data.

“Vinci empowers engineers to simulate how designs will perform in seconds instead of days, at a fraction of the compute cost,” said Vinci CEO Hardik Kabaria in the company’s press release. “On next-generation geometries that conventional tools must simplify, such as nanometer-scale components on centimeter-scale dies, Vinci maintains full-fidelity accuracy.”

Vinci says its software is already deployed at three leading semiconductor manufacturers, and has been successfully benchmarked at several more. The startup is currently offering scheduled demos through its website.

Quick hits

• In more Synopsys news, developer JuliaHub has announced that its Dyad simulation platform will be integrated with Ansys TwinAI (Ansys is now owned by Synopsys) to “combine physics-based simulation with adaptive AI models, allowing engineers to create ‘hybrid digital twins’ that are both predictive and grounded in physical laws.”
• CAM developer Ency has released Ency 2.5, an update with “130 changes focused on smoother day-to-day workflows and increased stability across machining, simulation, and platform features.”
• Artec 3D has launched Artec Studio Lite, a lower cost version of its Artec Studio software for 3D data capture and processing. Studio Lite does not support 3D scanning, but Artec says it will offer the core processing features of the full version with a simplified workflow for photos and videos. In particular, it provides AI photogrammetry, which Artec says can deliver accurate 3D models with very few photos. Artec Studio Lite is available in two tiers: Business ($960 per year) and Individual ($480 per year). The full version, Artec Studio Pro, costs $1,700 per year.

One last link

If you made it this far, you must like engineering news roundups. So here’s another one for you, from Engineering.com senior editor Ian Wright: 3D printing research roundup: Fast-curing concrete, blood vessels on a chip, micro delta robots and more!

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Nvidia and Synopsys team up to accelerate engineering appeared first on Engineering.com.

PTC has announced that it’s selling Kepware and ThingWorx, its brands for industrial connectivity and Internet of Things (IoT) software, to asset management firm TPG.

You might find this news surprising. PTC has long been bullish on those brands, particularly ThingWorx, which it bought in 2013 for approximately $112 million. The company even adapted the brand name for its erstwhile annual user conference, PTC LiveWorx, the last of which was in 2023.

ThingWorx was the first of several acquisitions for an IoT strategy that would cost PTC half a billion dollars over the next few years. PTC bought Kepware in 2015 for over $100M, machine connectivity provider Axeda in 2014 for $170M, and big data platform Coldlight in 2015 for $105M.

Industry watchers at the time noted the gamble PTC was taking on IoT. In 2015, Engineering.com contributor Verdi Ogewell asked: Is PTC’s CEO Jim Heppelmann Playing with Fire? to which the then-CEO replied: “[W]e are confident, and our customers agree, that not only is IoT an exciting new opportunity, but it will also reset expectations in the arenas of CAD, PLM, ALM [applications lifecycle management] and SLM [service lifecycle management].”

Ten years later, however, Heppelmann was gone (replaced by Neil Barua) and the IoT shine was starting to wear off. This summer a rumor was swirling that PTC might be acquired by Autodesk, and writing about that possibility, Engineering.com contributor Lionel Grealou noted that “ThingWorx and Kepware, once central to PTC’s digital transformation narrative, now appear most vulnerable to divestment.”

The Autodesk rumor went nowhere, but ThingWorx and Kepware have indeed gone somewhere. TPG and PTC didn’t disclose the terms of the acquisition, but they expect the transaction to close in the first half of 2026.

“We’re pleased to reach this agreement with TPG as we increase our focus on delivering our Intelligent Product Lifecycle vision for customers through our core CAD, PLM, ALM, and SLM offerings and the ongoing adoption of AI and SaaS,” Barua said in the joint press release.

Let’s check back in ten years to see how the AI play pays off. Speaking of…

Tech Soft 3D launches HOOPS AI for CAD machine learning

Engineering software development kit (SDK) provider Tech Soft 3D has launched HOOPS AI, a new tool that it says is “purpose-built to unlock AI and machine learning for CAD data.”

According to Tech Soft 3D, HOOPS AI is an end-to-end solution for CAD-based machine learning. It ingests and prepares CAD data, provides pre-built neural architectures for CAD tasks like feature recognition, and has built in visualization tools, among other features. It’s a standalone product that incorporates features from Tech Soft 3D’s HOOPS Exchange (for CAD data translation) and HOOPS Visualize (for CAD rendering).

“HOOPS AI represents a major leap forward for organizations looking to finally harness artificial intelligence for 3D CAD,” said Gavin Bridgeman, CTO of Tech Soft 3D, in the company’s press release. “It provides a complete, reproducible pipeline that makes machine learning workflows with CAD data both practical and scalable.”

Quick hits

• Chaos has released Vantage 3, the latest update to its real-time visualization platform for AEC. The update adds support for USD, MaterialX, and Gaussian splatting, as well as a new camera tracking features, a new material editor, extended texture support, and more.
• Siemens has introduced Electrical Designer for its TIA Selection Tool Cloud. The new feature aims to simplify main circuit design by automatically selecting components, verifying short circuits, sizing cables, and creating documentation, all in accordance with IEC standards, according to Siemens.
• Celus, a developer of AI-based electronics design software, and NextPCB, a PCB manufacturer, have announced a strategic partnership that will allow NextPCB customers access to the Celus Design Platform.

One last link

Who figured software licensing could be such a dynamic topic? Here’s Lionel Grealou again with From seats to outcomes: rethinking engineering software licensing.

Engineering Paper will be off for the next two weeks. See you in December.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post PTC’s IoT dream ends with sale of ThingWorx and Kepware appeared first on Engineering.com.

A few weeks ago I wrote about Flux, a browser-based ECAD tool, and its announcement of new AI capabilities to design circuit boards from text prompts.

I’ve since had the chance to speak with Flux CEO Matthias Wagner to learn more about the platform and its AI features. Like many founders of engineering software startups that I’ve spoken to recently, Wagner, a former Facebook product manager, was fed up with the stale state of design software—especially in comparison to tools for developing software.

“Hardware was somehow still stuck in what could have been the 90s,” he complained. And complained. And complained some more. Wagner grumbled about the problem so much that eventually a friend told him to “either do something about it or stop talking about it.”

He chose door number two, and in 2019 he founded Flux, a cloud-based tool for electronic design with modern features like real-time collaboration. But by 2025 Flux, like many design tools, has become enraptured by AI, and so has Wagner’s vision for the platform.

“You can go to ChatGPT and turn a prompt into a poem, into a recipe, into everything,” Wagner began. “We want to enable that for atoms. We want to enable people to go from a text prompt to a manufactured piece of hardware.”

How close is Flux to that vision today? I asked.

“It’s day one,” Wagner said. “Just two weeks ago we shipped what I call an AI hardware engineering intern that has incredible capabilities, but oftentimes requires some supervision by somebody who’s more experienced.”

All Flux users can now access that AI intern in beta (“I feel like interns are professionals in beta,” Wagner quipped). The AI can help electrical engineers across their entire workflow, from planning a design to laying out a circuit schematic to optimizing and debugging boards, according to Wagner.

“When it works, it’s magical,” he said. “There’s a lot of use cases where, just from a single prompt, it will do the full thing. And then there’s a lot of use cases that will get you, 80% there, 90% there, 50% there. And then the user has to either provide input or drive it over the line manually.”

Flux’s AI is built on top of commercial LLMs (like those from OpenAI and Anthropic) with some smaller custom AI models built in-house (like one for optical character recognition, OCR, to read charts and tables). The custom models are trained on a mix of publicly available designs, synthetic datasets, and in-house data, according to Flux. Wagner noted that “we don’t train models on user data.”

Flux is subscription software, licensed in four tiers: Starter ($15/month), Pro ($39/month), Teams ($49/month) and Enterprise (custom pricing). Each tier comes with some amount of AI credits (from 100 to 500 per month) which are spent every time a user accesses the AI. The cost of any prompt is only determined after the computation, Wagner told me, adding that there’s high variance.

Why? “It’s like trying to estimate the time it takes to complete a project that you have never done before,” Wagner said. “You’ll figure it out as you do it.”

I asked if he could estimate a rough cost of using Flux’s AI, and Wagner said that the company’s example prompts (such as those pictured above) would cost about $6 to $7 apiece. Since 100 credits cost $4 or $5 (depending on your tier), that’s roughly 120 – 175 credits per prompt.

If the Flux AI works as well as you’d hope, and could truly save hours of engineering effort, then the costs would be easy to justify. But what about when it doesn’t work? If you’ve used AI, and by now you have, you know that it often takes a few prompts to get where you want to go. Sometimes many more. If you had a mystery bill due on every prompt, you might be reluctant to experiment. Flux isn’t the only developer charging credits for AI calls (Depix does it for AI rendering, for example), but it’s the first I’ve seen that doesn’t have a standard price per prompt.

Regardless, what matters is whether or not electrical engineers find value in Flux AI. Wagner says users are “generally ecstatic” about the new capabilities, but I have yet to see much real user feedback. If you have some, I’d love to hear it in the comments or at malba@wtwhmedia.com.

Check out the 2025 LEAP Awards winners

Design World has announced the winners of the 2025 Leadership in Engineering Achievement Program (LEAP) Awards. Judged by an independent panel of industry experts, the awards celebrate innovative engineering across 11 categories.

The 2025 LEAP categories were:

• Advanced materials
• Computer hardware and software
• Connectivity
• Embedded computing
• Fluid power
• Industrial automation
• Mechanical
• Motion control
• Power electronics
• Switches and sensors
• Test and measurement

Congratulations to all those who leapt to the podium. You can watch a replay of the winners announcement or see a list of the winners here.

Quick hits

• NCG CAM Solutions has released NCG CAM v20.0. The developer calls it a major release that provides huge improvements to finishing operations, new features such as the ability to machine with shaped cutters in 3-axis, a new C/C#/C++ API, and much more.
• Keysight has launched a new EDA application called Quantum System Analysis that it says will reduce reliance on costly cryogenic testing. Part of Keysight’s Quantum EDA portfolio, Quantum System Analysis provides a time dynamics simulator and the ability to model cryostat input lines to qubits.
• Lumafield has announced Auto-Dimensioning, a new feature for automated geometric dimensioning and tolerancing (GD&T) in its CT scanning technology. “Auto-Dimensioning turns CT scanning into a true metrology tool, making it accessible to every engineer. By automatically identifying and measuring features inside and out, we’re giving teams reliable, traceable data they can use to move faster, catch problems earlier, and build better products,” said Andreas Bastian, co-founder and head of product at Lumafield, in the company’s press release. Currently in private beta, Auto-Dimensioning will be available in Lumafield’s Voyager software in early 2026.

One last link

My former colleague Shawn Wasserman led this fun Altair blog post that uses simulation to prove that Back to the Future, the classic time travel flick in which a teenager and mad scientist drive into the past, isn’t quite as realistic as you may have thought: Digital Debunking: Doc Brown’s Survival in Back to the Future.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Flux’s electrical engineering AI: “When it works, it’s magical” appeared first on Engineering.com.

Computer modeling and simulation has been a cornerstone of engineering innovation for decades. For applications ranging from aerospace products to consumer electronics, companies have long relied on computational models to test ideas, predict performance, and guide product development. Simulation is, at its heart, a decision support tool: data goes in, knowledge comes out, and critical choices are made with greater confidence.

But while simulation is powerful, creating and running sophisticated multiphysics models typically requires specialized expertise and expensive computational resources. As a result, simulation engineers have played a central role in turning the physics into actionable insights. However, it is common that organizations only have a small group of simulation experts, making it unpractical to have direct access to simulation across the organizations. Luckily, this paradigm is changing. The rise of simulation apps, powered by multiphysics modeling, neural-network-driven surrogate models, and GPU acceleration, is democratizing access to advanced simulation. These easy-to-use applications extend the reach of simulation far beyond R&D, enabling teams in the field, on the factory floor, and in the boardroom to make real-time, physics-informed decisions. In other words, simulation apps are no longer just about engineering; they’re becoming indispensable business tools as well. 

From Models to Apps: A Shift in Accessibility

The traditional workflow of simulation engineering has always been about precision. Whether focusing on a single physical phenomenon or coupling multiple domains together in multiphysics models, simulation engineers aim to capture reality as faithfully as possible. Single-physics simulations can provide excellent accuracy when one effect dominates, while multiphysics simulations enable engineers to include interacting effects for an even greater level of realism. Models are then validated with experiments and used to forecast behavior under a wide range of conditions, delivering confidence in their predictive power. With apps, validated models are encapsulated in streamlined interfaces, enabling users to simply enter parameters into intuitive fields (e.g., geometry, material properties, operating conditions) and receive precise results in real time. These apps make it possible for nonexperts to run analyses without needing to master finite element methods or specialized multiphysics software. 

To give an example of how apps make simulation more accessible, an audio supplier for luxury car manufacturers ran into challenges with evaluating how design tweaks to car interiors affected in-cabin acoustics. The organization’s engineers built a custom app on top of their core acoustics model, and instead of waiting for the simulation specialists to rerun models, a global and cross-functional team was able to simply input design changes into the app and see how sound quality was impacted. This streamlined workflow eliminated delays across time zones and kept development aligned with fast-changing car designs. 

Extending Simulation Beyond R&D

In various industries, simulation apps are increasingly being distributed across field operations, manufacturing, and even business management. For instance, one of the world’s largest suppliers of cement rolled out a simulation app for contractors that can help them decide on concrete curing times, a critical factor for both safety and profitability. The app integrates local weather data, soil conditions, and building geometry into a multiphysics model to predict curing timelines. With this app, contractors now make onsite decisions backed by physics, avoiding costly errors and delays.

Simulation apps are also being used in power grid maintenance. For instance, a utility company built an app for field technicians diagnosing cable failures. Instead of calling in simulation engineers or guessing based on limited test data, technicians input onsite observations into an app powered by multiphysics models. The app evaluates environmental and material factors in real time, enabling faster and more accurate troubleshooting and repair.

Let’s now consider additive manufacturing facilities. Factories that produce parts via metal powder bed fusion face challenges with humidity and heat control. Poor conditions not only compromise part quality but also pose safety risks due to the flammable nature of metal powders. A U.K. manufacturer built a simulation app to model its factory layout, incorporating variables like outside climate, machine placement, and operational schedules. Factory managers use the app to adjust ventilation and workflows in a way that keeps optimal production quality and worker safety in mind. 

A simulation app for predicting the conditions of an additive manufacturing facility. Image courtesy of MTC.

Another area where apps are being used is in the global food supply chain, where cold room managers face constant challenges around limited refrigeration space and food spoilage. A Swiss-led consortium used multiphysics simulation to predict fruit shelf life based on size, peel thickness, and storage conditions. The resulting mobile app provided real-time guidance to farmers and managers in rural India, cutting post-harvest food losses by 20% and boosting farmer income by the same margin.

An app forecasting fruit freshness based on multiphysics (left) and a mobile app offering insight into the expected shelf life of a crate in storage (right) based on science and real-time information. Image courtesy of Empa.

The Role of Surrogate Models

While simulation apps are powerful, running detailed multiphysics models in real time can still be computationally expensive. This is where surrogate models, often built using neural networks or other machine-learning-based reduced-order modeling techniques, benefit workflows.

Surrogate models act as lightweight stand-ins for full-scale physics solvers. They are trained on data from high-fidelity simulations and experiments and approximate the input–output behavior of the underlying model with high accuracy. Once trained, these reduced models can run thousands of times faster than traditional solvers, enabling near-instant predictions inside apps. For example, a transformer design team may need to explore hundreds of material and geometry combinations. Instead of waiting hours per simulation, a surrogate model embedded in their app can deliver results in seconds.

Harnessing GPU Acceleration

Another enabler of advancements in simulation is GPU acceleration. GPUs are designed for massively parallel computations, which map naturally onto the numerical solvers used in simulation. Simulation usually involve solving equations in millions of variables, and GPUs provide significant speedups over CPU-only computations.

For simulation apps, GPU acceleration means:

• Real-time interactivity: Users can adjust parameters and instantly see updated results, even for complex multiphysics models.
• Scalable deployment: Apps can be hosted on GPU-accelerated cloud platforms, allowing global teams to access powerful simulation capabilities without investing in high-performance local hardware.
• Support for hybrid workflows: GPU acceleration combined with surrogate models makes it possible for apps to dynamically switch between high-fidelity physics and fast approximations depending on user needs.

Simulation as a Business Tool

Looking at the business side of innovation, traditional systems rely on statistical models or linear equations to optimize inventory, scheduling, or financial planning. Apps extend this concept by embedding the fundamental laws of physics and chemistry into the decision-making framework. The result is unprecedented realism in forecasts and recommendations. For instance, rather than asking “What parts of this system do we need to change in order to minimize cost?”, business teams can ask, “How will humidity, airflow, and material properties affect part quality, cost, and safety?” Apps provide answers that account for real-world complexity, helping organizations minimize risk, accelerate innovation, and maximize performance.

Looking Ahead

The convergence of multiphysics modeling, surrogate models, and GPU acceleration is ushering in a new era of simulation. No longer siloed within R&D, simulation apps are growing as everyday tools across teams and departments. 

To summarize the business implications of these tools, we will see: 

• Faster time to market through accelerated design iteration
• Lower costs thanks to a reduced need for physical prototypes and postproduction fixes
• Broader adoption of simulation by empowering nonexperts to make physics-informed decisions

In short, simulation apps ensure that organizations can keep pace with an ever-changing world and enable smarter and faster decisions everywhere business happens.

Sponsored Content by Comsol

The post Simulation Apps: The Future of Decision-Making in Engineering and Business appeared first on Engineering.com.

Comsol, the developer of multiphysics simulation software, held its annual Boston conference from October 8-10, 2025. While Comsol Multiphysics can perform many simulations, such as mechanical, structural, and chemical, we’ll focus on electromagnetic use cases.

Comsol announced Multiphysics 6.4 through a series of sessions, each aimed at several uses across the engineering spectrum, and thus different users. The conference included exhibits from Comsol partner companies, which provide hardware, software, and consulting that expand the software’s capabilities. Attendees could see posters of Comsol use cases that appeared at conference sessions. The poster pictured below describes “Voltage Distribution in Metallized Cylindrical Film Capacitors.”

Comsol Multiphysics uses software modules that users install to perform simulations. One session covered low-frequency electromagnetics presented by Anslem Knobloch. The picture and video below provide an overview of use cases demonstrated at the conference. In the 1-hour session, Knobloch demonstrated simulations that covered:

• Capacitive touch screens and how they interact with a stylus pen. The model can analyze the capacitance at different locations in the grid, showing the position of the stylus tip.
• Electric fields generated from high-voltage power transmission lines.
• Insulated gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) modules in a circuit assembly capable of 1.8 kA at 1.2 kV. The simulation showed the current at any point in the IGBT module, how current affects heating at the interconnects and in the bus bar, and how the IGBT module becomes a heat source.
• Twisted cable modeling.
• Type 5 Litz Wire, showing how different twists improve performance levels and affect heating as frequency increases.
• Three-phase power transformers, where modeling shows how magnetorestriction can produce humming. In this model, you could see how transformer structure affects performance. This simulation required an analysis of structural mechanics and electromagnetic effects, including how a case affects performance.

This three-minute video summarizes Knobloch’s presentation:

Following Knobloch’s session, I attended an invited talk given by an engineer at Advanced Magnetic Labs that covered wireless charging design. This talk covered modeling of 15 W and 50 W Qi chargers. By simulating leakage flux, engineers could optimize power transfer and efficiency. The simulation lets engineers study flux density, self-inductance, and mutual inductance, among other parameters.

The post Seeing how engineers simulate and study electromagnetics appeared first on Engineering.com.

Siemens has released the 2026 version of Solid Edge. You’ll notice a difference right from the splash screen: the CAD software has officially been renamed Designcenter Solid Edge (for more on that moniker, read What is Siemens Designcenter?).

Designcenter Solid Edge 2026 (I won’t write that out every time) includes several new features, but let’s get the obligatory AI ones out of the way first. To start, there’s a new magnetic snap feature for assemblies that uses AI to automatically recognize mates and snap parts into the correct position as users drag them into place.

Solid Edge also uses AI to automatically generate up to 80% of 2D drawing views with minimal user input, according to Siemens. And finally, Solid Edge gets an integrated product support chatbot called Design Copilot that also debuted in Siemens NX this summer.

These aren’t Earth-shattering features, but I appreciate Siemens’ restraint in not overpromising on AI that it isn’t ready to deliver (cf. Is Autodesk’s neural CAD worth getting excited about?)

There are also non-AI updates in Solid Edge 2026. I’m happy to see that there’s now a dark mode, an always-welcome accessibility feature, plus scalable SVG icons and redesigned command bars that should make for a nicer UI.

Solid Edge 2026 also has new features for sheet metal design, including the ability to apply etches directly to curved surfaces, automatic trimming on flanges across multiple edges, new wall thickness support, and a new automated tab and slot command.

Have you ever wanted to navigate your Solid Edge model with an Xbox controller? Solid Edge’s new walkthrough command lets you interact with your assembly as if it were a video game, allowing users to get up close and personal with their designs. You can also record your walkthroughs to quickly create animations.

The 2026 updates also apply to Designcenter X Solid Edge, the new name for Solid Edge X, which is a SaaS counterpart to Solid Edge that Siemens launched with the 2025 release.

You can see a demo of all these new features and more in Siemens’ introductory video for Solid Edge 2026:

Designcenter Solid Edge 2026 and Designcenter X Solid Edge 2026 are both now available.

Q&A with Bentley CEO Nicholas Cumins

On last week’s Engineering Paper I wrote about Bentley’s slew of AI announcements at Year in Infrastructure 2025, which took place this month in Amsterdam.

While there I had the chance to sit down with Nicholas Cumins, Bentley’s CEO, to learn more about the company’s vision and plans for AI. Cumins spoke about why the digital thread is broken in the infrastructure industry, why business models are lagging behind technology, how engineering context is essential for AI, and more.

You can read my full Q&A with Cumins on Engineering.com: AI a “kick in the pants” for infrastructure sector, says Bentley CEO.

Quick hits

• Spatial has launched Analogue 26, the latest version of its Apple Vision Pro app for immersive design. The update adds support for the Logitech Muse, a stylus designed for the Vision Pro, allowing users to sketch and add annotations on top of 3D models. Spatial also released Analogue Portal 26, a companion iPhone app that allows users to collaborate in design reviews without requiring a Vision Pro headset.
• Concepts NREC announced the latest version of its Agile Engineering Design System, v2025.2. The turbomachinery design platform takes a new approach to volute modeling, adds integrations for CFD solvers including ADS Code LEO and Ansys CFX, introduces advanced tools for optimizing 5-axis machining toolpaths, and more.
• WestDev, developer of PCB design software Pulsonix, has announced a new integration between Pulsonix and Adam Research’s TRM analysis software for thermal risk management. The developer says the new integration “provides PCB designers with an efficient, data-consistent workflow for advanced thermal simulation and verification.”

One last link

Last week’s last link was to Design World senior editor Miles Budimir’s new column on engineering ethics. Not satisfied with one column, Miles has launched a second column focused on engineering disasters. Hopefully, readers of the first column can avoid being featured on the second.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Designcenter Solid Edge 2026 launches with AI design copilot appeared first on Engineering.com.

Bentley System’s annual Year in Infrastructure (YII) event took place last week in Amsterdam, capping off with the presentation of Bentley’s 2025 Going Digital awards for innovation in infrastructure.

There was a particular theme to the event that won’t surprise anyone.

“It’s clear we are at the threshold of a generational shift in infrastructure. Just as CAD and 3D modeling transformed engineering decades ago, AI is redefining how the next generation of infrastructure professionals will work,” Nicholas Cumins, Bentley’s CEO, said in his opening keynote.

Bentley announced a new generation of “AI-enabled” applications starting with OpenSite+ for civil site design. Bentley first announced OpenSite+ last year, but it has now moved from early access (“basically beta,” according to Cumins in a press briefing) to limited availability (“that software can be used in production”). The final step is general availability, but Bentley didn’t say when it expects that for OpenSite+.

Joining OpenSite+ in Bentley’s next-gen lineup are the newly announced OpenUtilities Substation+ for substation design, which will enter early access in November, and Synchro+ for construction planning and coordination, which will enter early access in December.

One of the AI features available in the next-gen products is the Bentley Copilot, an integrated AI assistant. I saw a brief but intriguing demo of Bentley Copilot at YII 2025, which goes beyond product support by actually interacting with models (e.g. “change the parking angle to 60 degrees” in OpenSite+).

Cumins told me that the Bentley Copilot is built on commercial LLMs (e.g. ChatGPT or Claude), but it’s not dependent on any particular one; Bentley can switch to whichever model provides the best performance as they all strive to outdo one another (“I think we’ve swapped it already a couple times,” Cumins said). The underlying LLM is not user-selectable.

Bentley’s next-gen applications aren’t only defined by their embrace of AI, Cumins told me. “Their fundamental architecture is also quite different, because they’re all organized around a digital twin,” he said. Part of what that means is that the new applications are fully cloud-based, opening the door to modern software capabilities such as multiple users working on the same project concurrently. Indeed, Bentley showed off just that capability in Substation+.

In a final piece of AI news, which Cumins told me was his favorite of the YII 2025 announcements, Bentley is launching an infrastructure AI co-innovation initiative to collaborate with engineering firms on the best way to bring AI to the industry.

“I’m very much looking forward to those conversations about how we can help even more,” Cumins said.

I’ll be publishing my Q&A with Cumins soon, so stay tuned for more from Bentley’s CEO.

Cesium is spreading

Another big thread at YII 2025 was the continuing integration of Cesium into the Bentley portfolio. Cesium, which Bentley acquired last year, develops technology for visualizing geospatial data.

“Cesium, pretty quickly, is getting integrated into many of our products that have a geospatial context, as a default thing that you can use when you’re designing, building, or operating infrastructure,” Patrick Cozzi, the founder of Cesium and now Bentley’s chief platform officer, told me.

For example, Bentley added support for 3D Tiles (an open standard developed by Cesium) into MicroStation 2025, the latest version of Bentley’s CAD software for infrastructure design. Cesium is also the geospatial engine for Infrastructure Cloud Connect, a new hub for navigating projects and assets that Bentley announced in Amsterdam.

Bentley also announced that it’s adding reality modeling services from iTwin Capture to Cesium ion, Cesium’s SaaS platform for optimizing and streaming geospatial data. That means Cesium ion will be able to create meshes, point clouds, and Gaussian splats from imagery and integrate it with other sources of data in the 3D Tiles format.

And then there’s iTwin Engage, a new platform that “blends iTwin, Cesium, Unreal Engine, and open standards to let teams and communities step inside projects before they’re built.” Currently in early access (read: beta), iTwin Engage allows users to develop 3D visualizations of their projects that stay up to date with a live connection to the project’s digital twin.

“iTwin Engage is built on Unreal Engine,” Cozzi told me, “so it brings all the game tech, that really amazing viz. It’s built on the Cesium plugin for Unreal Engine to bring in the geospatial context. Then it’s built on iTwin APIs that bring in design models, which are then converted to 3D Tiles.”

The Year in Infrastructure 2025 Going Digital Awards

And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for: Bentley’s 2025 Going Digital Awards. Several people described the ceremony to me, a first-time attendee, as “the Oscars of infrastructure.” It was, indeed, a swanky affair. I chose the beef and the “optional” in black tie optional.

Here are the 2025 Going Digital awards winners:

• Bridges and Tunnels: Italferr S.p.A. (Italy) – Leveraging Digital Technologies for Improved Infrastructure Management
• Cities, Campuses, and Facilities: Voyants Solutions Private Ltd. (India) – Preparation of Masterplan, Detailed Design and Project Management of Atal Puram Township, Agra, India
• Construction: Deloitte and Vale (Brazil) – SYNCHRO 4D Powering the World’s First Iron Ore Briquetting Plant
• Energy Production: Baosteel Engineering & Technology Group Co., Ltd. (China) – Digital Intelligent Construction Project for a Steel Plant Based on Bentley Technology
• Geospatial and Reality Modeling: Al Madinah Region Development Authority (MDA) (Saudi Arabia) – Manarah Urban Data Platform
• Project Delivery: Egis (France) – Canal Seine Nord Europe
• Rail and Transit: PT Kereta Api Indonesia (Persero) (Indonesia) – Smart Infrastructure by KAI & AssetWise Linear Analytics
• Roads and Highways: Jabatan Kerja Raya Sarawak (JKRS) (Malaysia) – Sarawak Sabah Link Road Phase 2
• Structural Engineering: AVS Engineers | ISID Architect, Nikhil Mahashur and Associates, Structural Engineer – Siddharth Sharma (India) – Fairmont Udaipur Palace
• Subsurface Modeling and Analysis: Fervo Energy (United States) – Cape Station
• Transmission and Distribution: China Energy Engineering Group Guangxi Electric Power Design Institute Co., Ltd. (China) – Application of GIS+BIM Digital Intelligence Technology to the Entire Lifecycle of China Southern Power Grid’s Guangxi Nanning 500kV Power Transmission and Transformation Project
• Water and Wastewater: PT Wika Tirta Jaya Jatiluhur (WTJJ) (Indonesia) – SPAM Regional Jatiluhur I: Transforming Water for a Better Tomorrow

Congratulations to all the winners.

In other news, three 2026 releases

• Altair has released HPCWorks 2026, the latest version of its high performance computing platform. HPCWorks 2026 has new features including advanced GPU integration, expanded AI and machine learning tools, and extended reporting, according to Altair.
• CAD developer IronCAD has released IronCAD 2026. Among other upgrades, IronCAD 2026 adds multiple application window support, general modeling and drawing improvements, and an enhanced AI chatbot.
• Allplan has launched a new version of its BIM software, Allplan 2026. Like Graphisoft Archicad 29, which I wrote about last week, Allplan 2026 features the AI assistant that parent company Nemetschek Group announced back in January.

One last link

Engineering.com sister publication Design World has launched a new monthly column devoted to engineering ethics. It’s penned by senior editor Miles Budimir, who’s been teaching the subject to engineering students for nearly two decades. Read Miles’ kickoff column on Design World: Ethical Engineering: A new monthly column.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Bentley bets big on AI for infrastructure appeared first on Engineering.com.

Flux, a browser-based ECAD tool, today launched what it says “could be the biggest advance in hardware since the invention of CAD.”

With such a grandiose claim, you already know it’s an AI something-or-other. In this case, it’s “agentic AI capabilities that can design circuit boards and source components based on simple natural language prompts.”

Flux, which launched its platform in 2023, already had an AI copilot that could answer user questions. With today’s announcement, the company says it’s reached a new level of AI capabilities that “effectively make it a junior hardware engineer.”

“Just describe what you need, and Flux handles the rest. It analyzes the prompt, breaks it up into a plan, researches part pricing and availability, generates a schematic diagram, connects the nets, and routes the board,” reads Flux’s press release.

An AI that can design PCBs sounds awesome, but I’ve heard this song before. I’m still waiting for SnapMagic Copilot, announced two years ago, to amount to anything other than a beta waitlist. Ditto for Cadstrom, a startup that announced $6.8 million in seed funding last December for an AI-based PCB validation tool. That has yet to materialize (and its website barely meets the definition of placeholder).

That’s not to say Flux won’t flourish where others have floundered. I’ll be speaking with CEO Matthias Wagner in a couple weeks to learn more, so stay tuned for further coverage.

In the meantime, if you’ve used Flux and want to share your thoughts, reach out to me at malba@wtwhmedia.com.

Bananaz launches AI Design Agent

Another week, another AI copilot for mechanical engineers.

Bananaz has launched Bananaz Design Agent, an AI agent that can analyze CAD files and drawings to provide feedback and answer user questions.

“It’s a collaborative platform that helps you to get a better design… think about it like a senior engineer that sits next to you and provides you all the insights,” Or Israel, co-founder and CEO of Bananaz, told me on an introductory call a few weeks ago.

Here are some sample questions Bananaz says users can ask the Design Agent:

• What DFM issues should I address before manufacturing?
• Can I replace any custom parts with shelf components?
• Perform a tolerance analysis and identify unnecessarily tight tolerances.
• I need general improvements—what do you recommend?
• How should I update my drawing to comply with the company standards?

Israel told me that Bananaz is web-based and that it currently has add-ins for Solidworks and Creo. “Our goal is to be able to provide value for every CAD software and to be agnostic completely,” he said.

Bananaz is built on top of several commercial LLMs, including ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and Anthropic Claude. Users can choose which model to use, which Israel says makes it easier for companies with existing AI policies to get stay compliant. I wondered which model worked best.

“Currently, our best results are with Claude,” Israel told me.

Interesting. But I still had one question: Why Bananaz?

“Because Apple was already taken,” Israel replied.

AI rendering goes full steam ahead

Depix, a generative AI rendering developer, has a new product called Depix ImageLab. The online tool lets users upload images to generate photorealistic product renders from text prompts. It works with anything from pencil sketches to CAD screenshots to existing renders.

I took ImageLab for a test drive and wrote about the experience in Is this generative AI rendering tool a “KeyShot killer”?

When I shared the article with Depix CEO Philip Lunn, he wrote back to highlight one advantage of ImageLab that I didn’t make explicit in the piece. I’ll allow him to do so here:

“[A] key differentiator to Keyshot and all other traditional renderers… is [these] are “renderings” without the 3d model. Any screen shot or sketch leads to photographic realism. So the interim step of cad data translation and tessellation and materialization and lighting etc is all gone,” Lunn wrote.

Check out the article for more details, including how to try ImageLab for free.

Quick hits

• Engineering.com sister publication Design World has released its October 2025 issue focused on diversity in engineering. Click the link to read a digital copy of the magazine. The stories are also featured on Engineering.com’s EDI (engineering diversity and inclusion) section, including a profile I wrote of manufacturing engineer Fernando Sarmiento with some great advice for young engineers.
• MathWorks has launched a new generative AI assistant, Matlab Copilot, that will be available in the latest release of Matlab and Simulink (R2025b). It will answer user questions, suggest code predictions, generate tests and more.
• PTC announced that its cloud CAD platform Onshape is now available on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Marketplace. “This launch enables customers to easily discover, purchase, and deploy the Onshape cloud-native CAD solution through a simplified procurement process while benefiting from consolidated billing and retiring their annual AWS commitments,” said AWS’s Michael Choe in PTC’s press release.
• Datakit has updated its CAD converters to version 2025.4, adding reading support for Creo up to version 12.0, Fusion up to version 2603.1.52, NX up to 2506.4000, and Parasolid up to version 38.0, among other updates.

One last link

Engineering.com senior editor Ian Wright describes his impressions from the 2025 Canadian Manufacturing Technology Show in Additive manufacturing, eh?

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Flux? That’s Bananaz! Two more AI agents for engineers appeared first on Engineering.com.

Leo AI, developer of a mechanical engineering AI assistant, has announced a new partnership with TraceParts, an online library of part catalogs and 3D models.

According to Leo AI, the goal of the partnership is to make it fast and easy for engineers to find the right parts.

“Instead of juggling filters,” the press release says, “engineers can simply type: ‘Find me a ball bearing with a 25 mm inner diameter, a lifespan of 10,000 cycles, and a speed of 8,000 RPM.’”

Leo AI’s so-called large mechanical model (LMM) will interpret the request, ask the user for clarification if necessary, and retrieve matching results from TraceParts. Here’s a quick video demo from Leo AI:

Last week I wrote about Leo AI completing a $5 million seed funding round. I gave an overview of the company’s AI platform based on an interview with co-founder and CEO Maor Farid, who told me that Leo could, among other capabilities, search through online catalogs to find parts for a given design (a spring for a suspension system, in his example).

“Leo looks for both online vendor catalogs and on your PLM, and it provides the springs that match the parameters that you specified or Leo calculated,” Farid said.

So what’s new here? I asked Farid to clarify how the TraceParts partnership will change Leo’s capabilities. This is his emailed response:

“Leo has always combined two things: doing the calculations to figure out exactly which part is needed, and then searching across PLM or vendor catalogs to find it.

What’s new with TraceParts is the scale and reliability it brings. Instead of searching across scattered catalogs, engineers now have direct access to one of the world’s largest, supplier-certified libraries – 112M+ parts and 2,100 catalogs – right inside Leo.

So the core capability isn’t new, but this partnership makes it far more powerful: faster searches, fewer mistakes, and much more confidence that you’ve got the right part. That’s why we’re so excited about it.”

Top Workplaces for Engineers 2026

In case you missed it in last week’s lengthy newsletter, Engineering.com is hosting its second annual Top Workplaces for Engineers program, and nominations are now open.

Here’s more from Engineering.com Editor-in-Chief Rachael Pasini:

“To be eligible, participating companies must employ at least 35 engineers or have an engineering workforce comprising 10% or more of their total workforce. The award is based on employee feedback captured by the confidential, research-backed Energage Workplace Survey. Participating companies will be evaluated against the industry’s most robust benchmarks based on more than 18 years of culture research.  

The award will honor companies that create exceptional workplace environments for engineering professionals across various industries, and we will publish the list of winners in the spring of 2026.

If you believe you work at a company that deserves such recognition and meets the criteria, nominate them at: engineering.com/topworkplaces. The nomination period runs through mid-January, but submit your nomination much sooner, before the busy end-of-year season kicks in with full force.”

3D Systems updates its software strategy

3D printing hardware and software developer 3D Systems has decided to double down on its proprietary polymer platform, 3D Sprint, and back off from its vendor agnostic software, Oqton Manufacturing Operating System and 3DXpert.

Why? Engineering.com senior editor Ian Wright weighs in with the unsurprising answer:

“If you’re going to talk about software these days, it seems to be a requirement that you use the phrase ‘artificial intelligence’ at least once… That certainly holds true for the latest announcement from 3D Systems, which led the press release that it would be selling off its Oqton Manufacturing Operating System (MOS) and 3DXpert business by emphasizing its decision to focus on its proprietary polymer software 3D Sprint as a response to ‘the transformative potential of artificial intelligence in additive manufacturing.’”

There’s more to the story than just AI, so check out Ian’s full article on Engineering.com: 3D Systems shifts its software strategy to focus on 3D Sprint.

One last link

For a long read on how engineering and design software could be rebuilt around AI, check out Patrick Hebron’s essay An All-Around Better Horse: AI and the Revolution in Design, Engineering, and Problem-Solving Methodology.

Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.

The post Leo AI teams up with TraceParts for AI part search appeared first on Engineering.com.