Autodesk & Bentley revolutionise AEC software interoperability
Published 2:13 am, Thu 17 Jul 2008
The biggest bane of the CAD industry is proprietary formats and the interoperability issues that they create. Passing data between CAD systems developed by competing software developers has always been hit and miss. As the design data gets more complex, containing more information, for instance as with products that support Building Information Modelling (BIM) processes, the file format issue mushrooms.
In a landmark agreement, Autodesk and Bentley, the two largest competing AEC software developers, have announced that they have an agreement to expand interoperability between their portfolios of Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) software. Autodesk and Bentley will exchange file format software libraries, including Autodesk RealDWG, to improve the ability to read and write both companies’ respective DWG and DGN formats.
Interoperability is a critical issue for users of design and engineering software. A 2004 study by the US National Institute of Standards and Technology found that users have direct costs of almost $16 billion annually from time wasted due to inadequate AEC software interoperability. With this agreement, and the interoperable workflows that it will enable, AEC firms will be free to employ software tools of choice from either Autodesk or Bentley to potentially accept or submit either DWG or DGN files.
For years Bentley has reverse engineered its DWG capability with the assistance of the Open Design Alliance (ODA) libraries and Autodesk has recently added basic DGN capabilities to AutoCAD by reverse engineering Bentley’s format as well. This announcement removes the need for this effort and expense, with the companies swapping technology to include in their products, which will greatly assist customers who need to migrate data or work in a multi-CAD environment.
The significance of this deal in the CAD world goes beyond the file format, as the two companies will also exchange product Application Programming Interfaces (API) to enable broader reuse of information generated during the design, construction, and operation of buildings and infrastructure, and by enhancing the ability of project teams to choose from Bentley or Autodesk solutions. Through supporting the reciprocal use of their available APIs, both companies will enable AEC project teams to combine products from both providers within integrated workflows. For instance, a design team could use a mixture of Autodesk and Bentley software, such as Autodesk’s Revit platform and Bentley’s STAAD and RAM structural products, and simulate and analyse their designs or manage project information using Autodesk NavisWorks software or Bentley’s ProjectWise.
People at Autodesk have long called Bentley Autodesk’s biggest unofficial developer, a title it has managed to achieve without being an accredited third party developer. This announcement brings Bentley in from out of the cold, where the two firms will seem to work in ‘co-opetition’, as there is some overlap in market segments, there is also synergy in others.
Jay Bhatt, Senior Vice President, Autodesk AEC Solutions commented, “Autodesk recognises that many customers use our products in mixed environments, and this agreement will help to better support these firms. As part of our commitment to provide technology that improves productivity and efficiency across the AEC industry, we’re pleased to enter into this agreement with Bentley Systems – Autodesk’s largest development partner – and together help customers design, build, operate, and maintain the world’s infrastructure.”
Greg Bentley, CEO of Bentley Systems added, “Bentley and Autodesk share a goal of enabling the creation and operations of better-performing infrastructure. Realising that our mutual users bear unnecessary costs resulting from lack of interoperability, we came together to finally make information reuse the norm. By raising its sights beyond file format issues, the resource-constrained AEC community can better serve us all.”
This is undoubtedly a turning point in the market, where industry-leading vendors, who are in serious competition, decide that the file format handcuffs that cripple the industry have to be removed. Autodesk is showing an ongoing commitment in both AEC and MCAD markets to exchange formats and APIs to those companies willing to reciprocate. However, the most important take-home here, is that this is the start of the global liberation of engineers’ and architects’ data.
