KUALA LUMPUR: The advent of the age of the Internet-of-Things – where a myriad of products increasingly get connected to the Internet – is a boon for Ansys Inc, a US-based engineering simulation software developer.
Based on the strength of Internet-of-Things and the company’s solid suite of simulation software that create virtual prototypes for users, Ansys vice-president of Asia Pacific Tom Kindermans said the financial markets have already described Ansys as being worth US$8 billion in market capitalisation on the back of 2013’s revenue of just under US$1 billion.
“The financial markets believe strongly in the strength of our technology. And in the Internet-of-Things, Ansys is the absolute leader in antenna design (which help products/machines communicate).
“The Internet-of-things is a major trend and everything has chips and we are successful in chip-design with 95 per cent of semi-conductor companies globally using Ansys,” Kindermans said.
He described Ansys as providing software that breathes life into design.
“We make sure designs work. The move towards virtual prototyping is speeding up the business by a factor of two- or three times (2X or 3X) and this helps businesses maximise their window of product-to-market.
“Being active in the product design area, we ensure products are functional, reliable and safe. We are a very relevant company for society as we push creation of physical prototypes further down the product development cycle and the design option is on the computer,” he explained.
In terms of cost savings for customers, Kindermans said that Ansys’ ability to manipulate virtual prototypes using multiphysics reduces the need to build physical prototypes which are traditionally time-consuming and costly, and this new process also helps businesses avoid product recalls, he added.
(Wikipedia defines multiphysics as treatment of simulations involving multiple physical models or multiple simultaneous physical phenomena, i.e. combining chemical kinetics and fluid mechanics or combining finite elements with molecular dynamics).
In Malaysia, Ansys has a strong foothold in the academia, ranging from institutions like University Malaya to Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, and even University Sains Malaysia, and also companies like Technip in the O&G sector; carmakers in the automotive industry and also the semiconductor sector.
In universities, he said, the software is used by students as well as deployed by professors to teach the students.
“I hope more engineers will adopt simulations as the future is in simulation-driven product designs. Every engineer should be using simulation in every stage of product development.
“The accuracy to be found in Ansys’ software products is the major differentiator against competitors. We have over 40 years of experience of optimizing mathematical models,” Kindermans said.
On a loftier note, Kindermans pointed out that there are a lot of applications where the simulation of the physical prototype is next to impossible, like the Mars Rover space vehicle or even entrepreneur Elon Musk’s Hyperloop mode of transport (a tube propelling people at great speeds across great distances over land) – and Ansys’ products are used extensively in simulations to prove that it is possible for the developments of these things.
The company, which is headquartered in Pennsylvania, currently has no plans to open an office in Malaysia.
In terms of mergers & acquisitions, Ansys had acquired 11 companies around the world in the past 15 years and it still has an appetite for more acquisitions, the Hong Kong-based Belgian said.
A heavyweight in industries like automobile, semi-conductor, aerospace, defence, and machinery, Ansys has 40,000 customers worldwide (comprising both commercial customers and universities), with 1/3 (one-third) of the company’s global revenue coming from Asia.
Within Asia, Kindermans noted, Japan continues to be the most important market where new developments are taking place.