Cadence Academic Network Welcomes Numeca and Pointwise Academic Users to Join Us!

At the beginning of 2021, Cadence made two big announcements: As part of the Intelligent System Design (ISD) Strategy, Cadence has acquired Numeca and Pointwise. This move strengthens Cadence’s competence in Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD). Ben Gu, Vice President of R&D at Cadence and one of the masterminds behind the ISD strategy, dives deeper into the impact of these acquisitions for Cadence.

However, even for a company like Cadence, which has managed many acquisitions in the more than 30 years of its existence, tapping into the CFD market is a courageous step since a typical microelectronics engineer and a typical CFD engineer have hardly interacted so far, but we believe that the situation is about to change. System design and analysis requires more and more multi-physics application, where different solvers, thermal, electro-magnetic, CFD, and others will interact with each other in order to give the system designer a fuller picture of the complete system before it is created.

With only a few hands-on tutorials, students at West Virginia University were able to generate many different mesh topologies to study the aerodynamics of a fairing

Just like Cadence, we are continuing to expand our network and the technical breadth of our program and community. Avid readers of this blog might remember a very similar article that I wrote one year ago on the integration of AWR and EMX users into the Cadence University Program; and now, we are sharing how the Cadence Academic Network will be supporting the academic users of Numeca and Pointwise software solutions.

 We are offering four academic packages for universities:

• Pointwise: This package contains the Fidelity Pointwise mesh generation software for mesh generation and preprocessing. Pointwise comes from the aerospace and defense industry, where, for decades, the software has been used to generate very large and complex meshes for aircraft, space launch vehicles, and their subsystems like turbopumps. Pointwise supports B-Rep NURBS and discrete geometry models; generates structured, unstructured, and hybrid meshes; includes a scripting language for creation of macros and templates, and is compatible with dozens of CFD flow solvers, including a plugin SDK so you can write an interface to any format.
• Flow: This package contains mesh generators Fidelity Autogrid and Fidelity Hexpress and the Fidelity Density-Based Solver for solving Multiphysics challenges with speed and precision. Fidelity AutoGrid offers an entirely automatic, multi-block, structured meshing environment, while Fidelity Hexpress, our fully unstructured hexahedral meshing solution with hex dominant options, can handle any complex geometry. Fidelity Density-Based solver allows engineers to solve multi-phase, -fluid, and -species challenges, from external aerodynamics for all speeds, from incompressible to supersonic, to combustion, cavitation, multispecies, particle flows and sprays to full engine simulation. Thanks to the Non-Linear Harmonic method and patented CPU Booster technology engineers can gain 3 orders of magnitude in solving speed for unsteady simulation.
• Turbo: This package contains mesh generators Fidelity Autogrid and Fidelity Hexpress, Fidelity Turbo with NLH, CPU Booster, and Uncertainty Quantification (UQ), the Fidelity Pressure-Based Solver, a full Optimization module, and HPC Acceleration Options. This toolset offers a complete end-to-end solution for turbomachinery design. Configurations range from multi-stage axial to radial to mixed-flow configurations (compressors, turbines, pumps, fans, propellers, or contra-rotating propellers).
• Marine: This package contains unstructured mesher Fidelity Hexpress, Fidelity Marine, and Fidelity CPU Acceleration Option for Marine. Dedicated to marine applications, this package functions as a virtual towing tank with built-in automation features, allowing engineers to perform resistance, propulsion, sea-keeping, and maneuvering calculations effortlessly, thanks to our simple-to-use, step-by-step process. One famous user of the Marine package is the Emirates Team New Zealand, who have used Fidelity Marine for optimization of the hull and foil designs of their ship. With these optimizations, the team was able to win the prestigious America’s Cup. 

Different use cases of Fidelity software

More information on the Cadence CFD University Program bundles can be found here. In addition to university network licenses, individual student licenses are available, learn more here.

For the CFD users that are new to the Cadence Academic Network, we want to share some of the other benefits we offer beyond just licenses.

• In order to connect with other members of the network, join our CFD LinkedIn group, where we post valuable information about new Online Training courses, internship and new grad positions, conferences with Cadence Academic Network participation, and other relevant material. For general information about the Cadence Academic Network, please subscribe to our Main LinkedIn Group. 
• We also participate in a variety of conferences, including CadenceLIVE, where academic users have the opportunity to attend and present their research or effective ways of educating using Cadence tools. Please contact us at academicnetwork@cadence.com for more information.
• Since you’re reading this article, you have found our Cadence Academic Network blog, where we blog about different topics around our activities.
• As members of the Cadence University Program, you can access Cadence Online Support and take advantage of the plethora of material about Cadence software. Once integration is complete, users will also be able to access material related to Pointwise and Fidelity. So, in order to get access to it, please write to universityprogram@cadence.com.
• Students and faculty can also access self-paced Online Training courses free of charge and earn a Digital Badge to show mastery in a certain technology or skill. CFD training material will be available in 2022.

If you want to reach out to us and discuss what we can do for you, please write us to academicnetwork@cadence.com. We are present in all regions where Cadence does business and we do our best to serve the academic community! For more information about the Cadence Academic Network, visit our website.