Altair Opens HyperWorks Platform to Third-Party Applications

By DE Editors

Altair Engineering’s HyperWorks Enabled Community

For more than ten years, Altair Engineering (Troy, MI) has made its HyperWorks platform available to customers using its patented Altair License Management system (ALM System). Under this model, users purchase license tokens known as HyperWorks Units (HWUs) that gives them access to metered usage of the entire suite of HyperWorks applications for a given period of time, usually one year. This business model provides an excellent value proposition because users gain access to all 28 individual Altair HyperWorks applications managed from one central license server and sharable across their entire enterprise.

In the recently released HyperWorks version 9.0, Altair madesignificant changes related to its licensing model and access to third-party partner applications. With these changes, Altair has opened its ALM System to third-party products. This new program, named the “HyperWorks Enabled Partner Program,” provides HyperWorks users the ability to run third-party applications using their existing GWUs.

“The HyperWorks Enabled Partner Program is a revolutionary new distribution arrangement,” explains Michael Humphrey, Vice President of Partner Programs for Altair. “It delivers increased value to our customers by expanding the suite of available applications with little or no incremental cost and minimal administrative effort.”

“Technical computing buyers are looking for innovative licensing schemes that will allow them to scale their infrastructure without being overly burdened by software costs,” said Addison Snell, Vice President and General Manager of Tabor Research. “Altair has responded to that demand with its HyperWorks Enabled Partner Program.”

Dr. Indranil Dandaroy, Principal Engineer, Acoustics at Hawker Beechcraft Corporation & Adjunct Professor, Wichita State University, added that “Altair Engineering’s new license sharing program of being able to use partner software at no additional cost to the user is a truly revolutionary ground-breaking concept.”

Program Benefits
According to Altair, the HyperWorks Enabled Partner Program offers users such benefits as:

• Easy access to a broader suite of software products at no incremental cost
• Optimized usage of already acquired GridWorks Units
• Increased productivity through on-demand access to innovative software technology
• Reduced overall software spend (The company explains that its on-demand model is very cost-effective when running infrequently used applications)
• Ability to quickly evaluate new applications without excessive administrative efforts or upfront and /or long-term commitments
• Direct technical contact with Enabled Partner Applications’ specialists
• Reduced costs associated with easier software license administration - IT specialists will not have to deploy a different license management system for each new application.
• Reduced costs associated with a simplified purchasing process—An opportunity to deploy new software technologies quickly and easily without creating a new vendor code or issuing a new purchase order.
 

Early feedback on Altair’s partner program appears positive.

“A comprehensive virtual validation of all vehicle functions requires the use various software tools,” Dr. Uwe Baake, Director CAE Commercial Vehicles for Daimler AG, said about the program, “Altair’s partnership with other tool providers and their inclusion in Altair’s licensing system meets the future needs of Daimler Commercial Vehicles.”

Kazuhiro Iijima, Manager of the Engineering IS Department Nissan Motor Company, added that “Nissan expects to achieve higher software utilization, leading to a higher ROI, which also means we can be more productive while actually saving cost.”

HyperWorks Enabled Applications
Six ISVs (independent software vendors) have enabled their applications on the HyperWorks Enabled Community already. These initial partners add leading CFD (computational fluid dynamics), electromagnetics,  fatigue/durability, and business analytics solutions to the HyperWorks platform.

They are:

• FEMFAT by ECS-MAGNA Powertrain – Fatigue/Durability suite
• FEKO by EMSS – Electromagnetics suite
• HiQube by HiQube – Business analytics suite
• MIME, CFD++ and CAA++ by Metacomp – CFD suite
• DesignLife by nCode – Fatigue/Durability analysis suite
• SC/Tetra by Software Cradle – CFD suite
 

Technical support services for any HyperWorks Enabled Partner application are offered through e-mail and telephone. Altair will serve as the first responder, handing support requests off to a partner company directly when necessary.

Technical product training is also available for all HyperWorks Enabled Partner Applications. Additionally, users have access to all maintenance releases and major version upgrades of the HyperWorks Enabled Partner Applications.

“Faurecia values the opportunity to access Altair’s partner applications through HyperWorks licensing mechanism at no additional cost,” said Bertrand Eteneau, Group CIO Vice President for Faurecia. “We are confident that the HyperWorks Enabled Partner Program will allow us to improve our software utilization and productivity over time.”

Altair plans to expand its HyperWorks Enabled Community partner solutions as quickly as practicable. Visit www.hyperworkscommunity.com  to learn more about this program and new partner solutions as they come online.