PTC Creo Announced for Project Lightning

Parametric Technology Corporation announced "creo, a PTC Product" at the at the Park Plaza Castle in Boston USA last week. "creo" is the name given to the overall design platform of PTC product development tools for "the next twenty years". According to PTC CEO Jim Heppelmann, creo "is the Latin root of the word create and... means I think, I create, I believe". Creo is slated as successor to the long-successful Pro/ENGINEER product line.

The new PTC Creo design platform is more than a new CAD program. Creo is a completely redeveloped design software framework that delivers a seamless and uniform design interface for modelling, drawing, simulation, detailing, manufacturing and other applications. Creo will accomplish this by means of a common data model capable of merging design information in from multiple design modes - not just parametric. With Creo, PTC answers four ongoing pain issues widespread in product development industries today:

1. Ease of use for casual users and non-CAD personell
2. Interoperability to use CAD files from any given CAD program
3. Switching costs caused by migrating data from other CAD software
4. high-level configuration driven design with multiple variations

PTC Creo will answer these problems respectively via the four cornerstone technologies upon which new Creo applications are built:

• AnyRole Apps - scalable, easy and "role specific" applications for all types of users
• AnyMode Modeling - seamless data portability across multiple CAD drawing modes
• AnyData Adoption - enables direct CAD file editing in Creo from any CAD system
• AnyBOM Assembly - drive 3D CAD assembly configurations using Windchill PLM - watch THIS...

The full event can be watched HERE. What I find interesting about AnyMode Assembly is PTC's departure from today's typical large-CAD business rhetoric, insisting that all CAD users are best served using in-depth 3D design mode tools. In observation, Brian Shepherd Executive Vice President, PTC Product Development stated "some users... are best served working in a 2D mode." He went on to say "We don't need a religious zeal around converting from one mode to another. We're about any mode."

PTC has an initial release target of summer 2011 for the new "Creo, a PTC product". CAD users are encouraged to keep their PTC maintenance current and active, so as to be in best position to enjoy these new technologies when they are released. For more information in Australia about either PTC Pro/ENGINEER or next year's new Creo platform, feel free to contact CADDIT here.