Building a Symbiotic Relationship with Engineering Web Site Vendors and Visitors

How do you turn Web site visitors into customers? Better still, into loyal and frequent customers that prefer buying from your company? One answer is to build a symbiotic relationship with those customers who you supply products to, by saving them time and helping them to do their jobs better.

The manufacturing industry largely designs products with CAD probably in 3D. Instead of hiding their CAD models away on engineering department computers, some manufacturers are giving them away (or at least giving away an IP protected version of them) to customers. By providing freely downloadable 3D CAD models, they save design engineers time and make it easier to select their products over competitors' products. In return, their parts are 'locked and loaded' into designs and enjoy sales in proportion to the sales success of those designs. In addition, they help speed up their customers' time to market and they speed up orders for their own products. A genuinely symbiotic business relationship is created and customer loyalty increases.

Manufactured Products Market and the Convergence of Five Key Trends

The manufactured products market exceeds $15 trillion/annum worldwide of which $4 trillion/annum (T) is in the U.S. - about one-third of the U.S. GDP. About half of the $4T consists of standard, off-the-shelf engineering parts (bearings, springs, fasteners, etc.) and engineered assemblies (gear boxes, engines, compressors, etc.), while the other $2T is final products sold to consumers (cars, planes, refrigerators, etc.). Currently, the manufactured products market is seeing the convergence of five key trends:

Manufactured products are typically designed with 3D CAD - lower costs and proven benefits have made designing in 3D CAD ubiquitous across the manufactured products market.

Engineers and buyers increasingly search for and select products online - for efficiency purposes, 93 percent of engineers, designers and buyers now search for and compare products (components and assemblies) online 1.

As a result, online searchable catalogs and/or CAD model catalogs are replacing print catalogs - to meet the online expectations of these users, manufacturers are gradually transitioning from print catalogs (100 percent have a printed catalog) to CD catalogs to online PDF catalog files (50 percent2 have PDF catalogs) to searchable digital catalogs (3 percent have digital catalogs). This trend is accelerating as customers, familiar with the ease of use of successful Web sites e.g. Google, Yahoo, eBay, etc., expect manufacturers' catalogs to have equivalent ease-of-use features such as refined attribute searching, downloadable 3D CAD models and 3D configurators of complex parts and assemblies (see Figure 2).

Marketing spent by industrial suppliers is growing fastest online - in 2005, U.S. manufacturers spent approximately $23 billion/annum on advertising, including printed and online catalogs for parts and assemblies. About 5 percent ($1.1B) is currently spent on online marketing and a 20 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) is expected over the next three years to $2.0 billion by 2009.3 Manufacturing companies seeking marketing efficiency and cost reductions are increasing the proportion of their marketing budgets that is spent online.

Software as a Service (SaaS) is approaching mainstream adoption - companies of all sizes are adopting SaaS in order to get solutions implemented more quickly, achieve faster ROI, lower IT costs and total cost of ownership. According to one study, 74 percent of companies said they implemented a SaaS customer relationship management (CRM) solution in two months or fewer and achieved ROI in six months or fewer. 4 The study points out that this type of metric is not limited to CRM, SaaS is being adopted in financial management, product lifecycle management (PLM), procurement and sourcing, supply chain management (SCM) and others; more than half of all companies plan to make a three year commitment to SaaS procurement and sourcing solution as a precursor to fully committing to that delivery method.

Creating a Symbiotic Business Relationship and Customer Loyalty

Companies now have to decide which digital catalog technology including CAD download capabilities to use or standardize on. As of mid-2006, the digital catalog market is highly fragmented and no clear leader has emerged. Many online catalog technologies are available in the manufacturing space. The digital catalog market has, to date, proven to be a slow market and a lengthy enterprise sale partly because the primary focus of catalog vendors varies from procurement to enterprise resource planning (ERP) integration to transactions to product selection. The convergence of the above trends makes product selection extremely important, particularly the subsequent download of 3D CAD models. CAD model download solutions are changing the cost/benefit and creating excellent ROI opportunities for online digital catalog solutions as the case studies illustrate (see Case Study 1 and 2).

All competitors offer the promise of digital catalogs usually with e-commerce options and some offer 3D CAD download options, but they use different technologies and methodologies that dramatically affect the flexibility and costs - both initial and long term. The three major areas of concern are: The '3D CAD Models,' the 'Catalog Design and Search Capability' to find them and the 'Business Model' to control both setup and recurring costs.

3D CAD Models

Obviously having the 3D CAD models is a prerequisite, but how they are obtained, maintained and presented is critical to success. Here are the main things to consider:

Source: Is a CAD Model 'Factory' Available?
Even if you already have all of your parts available as 3D CAD models, you may not want to present those for download. Why? You want to protect the intellectual property at the heart of your products, so it may be fine to share the motor casing and mounting dimensions, but not the detailed internal design features. From your customer's point of view, a smaller 'envelope' CAD model is faster to download and all that is necessary to incorporate within their design (see Figure 3). So re-use of existing CAD models might look like a cost saving starting point, but when you factor in your CAD resources spending time hollowing out existing models instead of working on new product designs, it probably is not cost-effective to do this. Sometimes CAD models or the resources to build CAD model are not readily available; for example, many distributors do not have CAD resources in-house. The best solution is when the digital catalog supplier has CAD services capability - 'a CAD factory' - in a one-stop solution that provides data engineering services to deliver a consistent online look and feel for your CAD models. You must ensure that the CAD 'factory' personnel are highly trained in CAD systems and can build models for full functionality, allowing for motion control, relational and parametrically driven parts, as well as derived 2D dimensioned drawings if required by your customers. The second best solution is to use a third-party CAD factory, but you then have the difficulty of managing and coordinating the third player. Building your own models should be the last choice, unless you have spare engineering capacity. However, once the CAD models are created, it is important to ensure that the associated attributes (manufacturer, part number, etc) are consistently and accurately included because this helps ensure that your components are ordered when buyers later process the design.

Format: Are They Reusable?
The best solution is to have the models created using a commercially available 3D CAD program. Leading 3D CAD packages include Pro/ENGINEER®, SolidWorks®, UGS®, Catia®, Autodesk Inventor®, etc. They are able to create CAD models for customers in either the native format used to create the model, or in one of the common interchange formats such as IGES, STEP or DXF. By creating models using a commercial CAD package, you ensure that you can update or modify your models anytime you need to. With every major CAD system supporting full interchange using neutral formats such as STEP and IGES models, this is the best solution for delivering CAD models to your customers. The least flexible solution is one not based on a commercially available CAD package, but which uses a proprietary scripting languages in which the data has to be defined and is thereafter tied to that proprietary language and solution. Suppliers that use scripting languages usually claim that the models can subsequently be saved in most native CAD formats. Technically, this is true (i.e. the model file extension, *.xxx may match the native CAD system), but the models can be overloaded with lots of extra features such as datum planes and axes that can make it harder for the designer to use them. Some scripting languages are complex to learn and do not offer the ability to manage complex CAD assemblies that commercial 3D CAD packages do. Further, once you have selected a proprietary scripting language, you are locked into this software vendor. There are thousands of available CAD consultants who can build your models using a commercial CAD program, but if you select a scripting language based system, you have no alternative but the vendor.

Size: Are They Small Enough?
3D models are often very data-intensive resulting in files that can be so large that they are slow to download, and when added to large assemblies they can overload the workstation making the assembly cumbersome to use. Ensure your selected CAD model factory is expert in keeping CAD models as small as possible - your customers will appreciate your models all the more for it!

How Will the CAD Models Be Maintained?
The real difference between vendors is maintenance of the CAD models. The best choice is to have a service vendor with a built-in 'CAD factory' to maintain the CAD models for you in a one-stop-shop, so there can be no finger pointing between vendors. Confirm that the vendor uses state-of-the-art, Web-based, project management tools that you can access to easily send requests for new models or engineering change orders for existing models. Quality assurance issues or customer questions should also be handled in this way. The second choice is for you, or a third-party vendor, to maintain your models. This requires allocation of your internal resources (perhaps to first learn a 3D CAD system), building and maintaining the CAD models and ensuring that your internal resources have learned and maintained a Web-based online administration system to upload and manage the CAD files, or managed a third-party to do it. In either case there is no single point of responsibility and some figure pointing between vendors is likely when a model isn't working correctly. When maintaining scripting language solutions be sure to understand any limitations you may have going forward. Since the models are not produced in a commercial CAD system, you may be perpetually tied to working with your vendor for maintenance.

What if a Product's Model Changes?
Building a lasting customer relationship involves the ability to quickly communicate model changes to customers. Change may occur due to a supplier change, an engineering change or a product's model may have been altered. If your customer has this product in their design, but is unaware of the change there could be major problems for that customer during final assembly of their product. A unique and industry-first solution is the ability for users to enable product change notifications for a specific product. Using the user's registration e-mail, a company can quickly inform their customers of an engineering change that affects the model.

Are the CAD Models Affordable?
When similar product families exist, the best solution is usually to build fewer, but more complex, master models from which all of the parts can be dynamically generated, rather than building a single CAD model for each unique part. The master model is modified by using a 'family table' of dimensional data (similar to an Excel spreadsheet). Individual CAD models can then be generated dynamically as needed. Typically 90 percent of the cost to build models is based on the number of master models needed and the master models are priced according to their complexity and the time needed to create each one. If you want to host CAD models on your Web site, you'll need to create models in each native and neutral CAD format that your customers require. There will be a cost associated with generating, exporting and maintaining each part number in the many various file formats. The best and easiest choice is to select a vendor that can automatically create and deliver models in the formats usable by all major CAD systems. If you need 2D drawings as well as 3D models, ensure that you select a CAD factory that can produce 2D as a by-product of the 3D models. This will dramatically lower the cost of providing 2D drawings. Some vendors create and dimension each individual part file and hence, may charge excessively. Be aware that for 2D drawings, typically 70 percent of the cost to the customer is based on the time needed to create and dimension each master drawing created from the already built 3D master model. The remaining 30 percent is incurred by the time needed to pull up each individual drawing (part number), clean up each dimension on the drawing and export out each desired file format per requested part number. Cleaning is required for each individual drawing because as a part's features change, so will each dimension on the master drawing. Most CAD model vendors do not provide 2D dimensioned drawings because of the cost and time needed to create and dimension each individual file.

What About 3D Models for Customized Products?
When configured products require 3D models, the cost of creating and maintaining all of the possible 3D combinations and 3D formats is often cost-prohibitive. A 3D model solution that can dynamically generate 3D models based on user defined values, such as a cylinder's precise stroke length, delivers immediate value to engineering customers. Not all 3D model download solutions can deliver true customized 3D models. Some solutions only offer customized 3D models that have pre-defined values. For example, a custom cylinder's stroke length may be between 1ft and 3ft, in which case you would want to allow your customer to enter in a value of 2 3/8" and download the 3D model. The best solutions provide this ability, while other solutions only allow users to download 3D models in say half-inch increments. Custom or dynamic parameters can be added to a URL on the company's Web site via a Web configurator or Web page. This approach enables complete flexibility and lowers overall cost by enabling a few 3D models to support perhaps millions of products.

Quality: Will They Meet User's Expectations?
The challenge of keeping errors to a bare minimum can be a daunting task when it comes to building perhaps thousands of CAD models. Hundreds of thousands of pieces of data can be used in a single project, making it very difficult to transfer data accurately. One way of addressing this problem is a four-stage approach:

Stage 1: All dimensional and technical information needed to create a project is collected and a specification prepared for the client in a manner consistent with industry design standards to ensure correct design, modeling and drafting techniques are used. The specifications include exact methodologies for creating consistent features throughout like parts, all necessary technical information and QA sheets.

Stage 2: Family table data is double-entered by professional data entry personnel. The dual tables are then programmatically compared and any mistakes corrected.

Stage 3: After inserting the family table data into the master model, all variations are then manually exported and visually checked by the designer for any modeling errors.

Stage 4: Following the model and drawing creation stage, a 100 percent visual and electronic quality check is performed on every master model and a statistically valid sample of associated parts (created from family tables) is checked by quality control engineers.

How Flexible is the CAD Model Viewing?
The best solution accommodates any viewing technology that you might want to use now or in the future. Therefore, select a vendor that supports multiple viewing outputs. If you choose a vendor that uses a leading commercial CAD system, your solution will likely be future proof. Many users who download CAD models will have a CAD system installed on their computers, but you don't want a CAD system to be an essential requirement that limits adoption. To serve the most users flexibly, try to require the lowest common denominator on the users system - usually just a browser and an online connection. For viewing CAD models, Web browser users can install, usually automatically, a free 3D viewer plug-in. Be sure that the viewer has basic measurement capability because if this ability does not exist, the designer might be forced to download multiple parts into his/her CAD system to determine if a particular dimension of the part meets the needs. As Mozilla Firefox becomes more popular (in particular for Unix workstations), it is a good benefit if your viewer can support both Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Can I Add CAD Models to My Existing Web Site?
The best solution allows companies to add 3D models to their Web site via a simple URL. A URL-based 3D model integration allows for maximum html flexibility and very fast implementation of 3D model downloads. This raises the question, "if it's that easy couldn't I just add 3D models to my web site to save money?" Of course this is possible but companies that have gone down this path have discovered that it is difficult to perform this activity as productively as specialists. Outsourcing your 3D models frees up internal resources to focus on activities that are not readily outsourced. CAD systems, 3D viewers and Web technology is rapidly changing and a specialist can deliver long term value at a competitive cost.

Several market trends have converged to create a new sales and marketing opportunity for industrial suppliers (manufacturers and distributors). Design engineers spend a significant proportion of their time (some estimate up to 25 percent) searching for stock parts and creating CAD representations of these parts for use in their designs. The information they rely on to identify parts needs to be accurate, up-to-date (online) and complete (including 3D and 2D CAD geometry) because their choice of component supplier can be directly affected. They expect design efficiency gains through re-use of CAD models and from reduced communication dialogue with suppliers (24/7 self help and download, in contrast to multiple emails and bulky attachments). Providing online 3D CAD model downloads helps them get their designs to market faster (see Figure 4) and often 'locks' products into a new design so suppliers later benefit from the sales success of that design.

Industrial suppliers who meet these expectations by making an ongoing investment in their Web sites via online catalogs with CAD model downloads (and possibly e-commerce and configurators) can expect increased sales and lasting customer loyalty (see Figure 4) by providing a compelling reason for design engineers and buyers to return repeatedly to their Web sites.

John Major is CEO of Catalog Data Solutions (San Jose, CA). As a founder of InPart, VP of PTC (after PTC bought InPart and incorporated it into Windchill) and CEO of Catalog Data Solutions, he has led the development of three generations of manufacturing catalog and CAD download software. Visit the Web site at >www.catalogdatasolutions.com

[Part 2 will discuss the importance of search in catalog design as well as the pros and cons of business models (including short and long term costs) that might be selected to build this symbiotic relationship with customers.]

References

GlobalSpec Summer 2005 Survey

Google/ThomasNET November 2005 survey

Venture Analytics Inc, Study for CDS, 2006

Aberdeen Group, SaaS Adoption Study, 2006