Vehicle Design Moves from Concept To Delivery In Less Than Six Months

Aug. 4, 2011
Military craft is created using new manufacturing paradigm based upon online crowdsourcing for product co-creation.

The partnership of Dassault Systmes and Local Motors resulted in the first co-created military vehicle, according to the companies. Local Motors was asked to develop a vehicle body design that could support two types of missions -- Combat Reconnaissance and Combat Delivery & Evacuation.

Dassault Systmes Version 6 platform and Local Motors' experience in crowd-based design and manufacturing, allowed for the vehicle to go from concept to working prototype in less than six months.

Participants in the challenge submitted their designs online for review. Feedback from the community of more than 12,000 designers and enthusiasts enabled participants to incorporate novel ideas and concepts from their peers, helping to create a better vehicle in an open source process. After receiving and validating more than 150 design entries, Victor Garcia's FLYPMode design was named the winner of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA) Crowd-derived Combat-support vehicle (XC2V) Design Challenge and was subsequently built into an operational prototype.

"We both see the future of product creation based upon an open process where we gain wisdom from the masses in order to deliver truly relevant products," said Jay Rogers, CEO of Local Motors.

Dassault Systmes supported the project on several levels by providing technology for individuals to design independently and collaborate amongst each other. The company's 3DVIA Composer was provided to each design participant as part of the project ignition kit; CATIA was used for packaging and component designs; ENOVIA was used to store and manage both CATIA and SolidWorks design data; and SIMULIA was used for virtual testing and analysis.

With a focus on streamlining product development, Local Motors is pioneering a new manufacturing paradigm based upon online crowdsourcing for product co-creation where a virtual community collaborates to leverage the collective knowledge base in order to develop the most optimal solution. "Product co-creation as envisioned by companies such as Local Motors requires a new holistic approach to product development," said Al Bunshaft, managing director, North America, Dassault Systmes.

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