Alliance between NEC and ESIParis 24 November 2000 Nihon ESI, ESI Group's Japanese subsidiary, and NEC announce a strategic cooperation agreement dedicated to the development of the first Virtual Engine Factory system. The system will simulate the entire process of building an automotive engine, from design to manufacturing, including the engine's motion. Developed by NEC and ESI Group, the Virtual Engine Factory system will be designed for the NEC supercomputer SX-5 using ESI Group's advanced MCAE technology.
"ESI Group's solution for the crash simulation has revolutionized the industry and now our share is about 80 percent of the Japanese automotive market", said Dr. Kohei Ando, COO of Nihon ESI, "while NEC provides, with the SX-4 and SX-5, high performance computation technology to a large number of companies worldwide, and specially to the automotive industry. We are confident that by combining our technical advantages, the Virtual Engine Factory system will help both companies to expand their market share in the automotive industry."
"The Virtual Engine Factory system will shorten the time for design and manufacturing largely by carrying out the simulation on supercomputer, instead of real experiments and prototyping", said Vincent Chaillou, CEO of ESI Group's Software Division. "As our customers will obtain better knowledge about the state of the inner parts of their engine in motion, they will be able to lighten the weight of their engines, improve the performances, and strengthen the durability." The cooperation agreement involves the development of the simulation system for the SX-5 supercomputer, along with the development of the pre and post processors. This includes the casting analysis for the engine parts such as the cylinder block, the combustion analysis inside the engine chamber, the dynamic stress analysis of the parts of the engine in motion, the fatigue durability analysis, and the lifetime analysis. The joint project will be conducted with an automotive company in Japan. After the validation stage, the Virtual Engine Factory system will be released within one year.
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