Innova's SolidWorks Blogspot

SolidWorks recently asked customers to participate in a satisfactory survey, rating the quality of technical support provided by their reseller.

The results have just been announced at this years SolidWorks World event in Anaheim. At Innova Systems, we were extremely proud to hear we ranked number one from over 100 resellers in Northern Europe!

This is great news for us and our customers, ensuring you will always receive the highest level of support from us.

Alan

SolidWorks is used in innovative technologies in all walks of life. I noticed Innova customer Plastic Logic featured in a technology article on MSN today. Plastic Logic are using SolidWorks to keep them at the forefront of developing 'electronic paper'. It's an interesting new technology that will no doubt be big in years to come.

Alan

It's great to hear success stories about our SolidWorks users. CDi Worldwide, an Innova Systems customer specialising in packaging machinery, has been featured in Business Weekly for their growth in such hard economic times.

We've seen a lot of engineering companies struggle in 2009, but some have flourished by investing in R&D to build a strong product line to tackle the downturn. CDi are one such company, having doubled their staff and looking to recruit five new candidates, they predict their turnover to double to £1.5m this year.

Great news for the custom packaging machine manufacturer from Suffolk, and we continue to wish them the best.

Alan

Innova Customer Round Peg are a Cambridgeshire based product design consultancy run by Nick Harrison. Nick is resident of Oakington, where in 1909 a pair of residents entered a competition to build the first British plane to fly a circular mile. Their design never left the ground, and a hundred years on, Nick is building a replica of the plane based on the design remodelled in SolidWorks.


Using donated materials and modern manufacturing techniques (Nick didn't want to use a hammer and chisel!) the plane is taking shape. At the moment they're looking at the engine, revisiting the original specification to give it enough power to comfortably fly.

Best of luck Nick.

Alan

Each year, SolidWorks Corp host a showcase event called SolidWorks World for users, enthusiasts and staff alike. I attended last years event in Florida and it was a brilliant experience. Below is a photo of some of the Innova team with SolidWorks CEO Jeff Ray at the Award's Dinner:


This year it's being held in sunny Anaheim, California on 31st Jan - 3rd Feb (which is good news with all the snow we've been having here in the UK!).

The days events include morning keynote speakers (this years headline guest is film director James Cameron!) and the afternoons are filled with technical sessions you can attend to brush up your SolidWorks skills. For a design engineer, I would highly recommend these tech sessions - the content, range and quality is superb, and they are all run by SolidWorks staff or industry experts.

See if you can persuade you boss to let you go...

Alan

I came across an interesting story this week, how a SolidWorks customer has adapted one of its products for use across two vastly different markets.

SolidWorks is well established in snow sports, with customers such as Burton designing high performance snowboard bindings. So it was great to hear how a snowboard helmet company RuRoc have adapted a snowboarding helmet for use by Formula One pit crew teams.

Having made the necessary modifications such as fitting flame proof linings, RedBull Racing and McLaren have both used their helmets in recent seasons.

Alan

Following my last blog about a squeezy marmite pot, i've discovered another Innova customer who've developed a squeezy device.

Prestigious design house Cambridge Consultants are releasing a new product called Suma, a handheld interface to overhaul how we interact with computers. Suma translates your squeezes to manipulate movement through the internet ofr in video games. Pretty cool technology that they predict will become big in coming years.

Alan