Virtual CAD Machines: Great For PLM Integration And Team Work

Team collaboration with virtual CAD machines is straightforward. There are also different options to integrate virtual CAD machines with PLM systems. Here's an overview. 

Designing and engineering products is a team sport. Digital collaboration with CAD systems is therefore a must-have.

Designairspace offers the design collaboration capabilities that you can use with CAD workstations. Here’s an overview.

Team collaboration

For product design teams, there are the following three ways to collaborate on 3D CAD data

1- Shared Drive: teams access and store their design data from a shared disk.

This is the easiest setup. Within the designairspace cloud, team members work from a shared drive to share and collaborate on CAD files. 

2- File synching: teams synchronize a ‘box’ or a ‘dropbox’ folder in the cloud.

All contents in this folder are synched. Any changes, additions and deletions are synchronized across the virtual machines ‘box/dropbox’ folder. With this setup, the box/dropbox folder in the cloud serves as a backup for the data stored in the virtual CAD machines.

3 - Synched shared drive. The best of 1 and 2. 

This is a combination of Shared drive and file synching. In this case, the shared drive  is synched in the Box/Dropbox cloud, serving as an external backup. 

Integration in PLM Systems

Implement PLM in the designairspace cloud

This option is ideal for Hardware startups. Once they decide they need a PLM system, they can install and run any PLM system in the designairspace cloud. To this end, clients can add servers and storage (typically within a Virtual Private Network).

Connection to existing PLM system through a VPN tunnel.

This setup is ideal for offering a home office setup. Employees connect via a standard VPN tunnel to the PLM system.  

 Install a File Caching Server at designairspace.

This setup is ideal for small to medium-sized remote locations. The file caching server (FCS) runs in the designairspace cloud, close to the virtual CAD machines. The FCS is in the same network with near-zero latency and virtually infinite bandwidth. End users in this setup will experience a great performance, especially when loading assemblies stored in the cache. 

Federated PLM: designairspace as a site in a multi-site setup

Do you have a multi-site PLM implementation? Do you have an international footprint? Than this is the ideal approach to consolidate the overseas engineers in the designairspace cloud. We recommend to set up an international site for this purpose in the designairspace cloud. 

Want to see how it works? Try our free trial today.