CoCreate Supports Lattice3D Format

LOS ALTOS, California, March 2, 2005 - CoCreate Software, Inc., a leading provider of flexible CAD and collaborative PLM software applications, and Lattice3D today announced an agreement that will make Lattice3D's XVL publishing technology available within CoCreate's 3D CAD product, OneSpace Designer Modeling.

This partnership advances CoCreate's strategy of offering its customers multiple formats to choose from for lightweight viewing and collaboration around 3D CAD designs. Lattice3D's highly compressed XVL format becomes part of a growing list of lightweight viewing formats that can be easily published from directly within Designer Modeling.

Lightweight formats, like the Lattice3D technology, offer an easy way for manufacturers to interact with their designers and extend the reach of 3D CAD design data within the organization without requiring users to have CAD expertise. For example, manufacturing, procurement, technical illustration, sales, marketing and customer support can each interact with 3D CAD designs to provide their expertise in design reviews or use 3D data in their own activities and deliverables.

"CoCreate customers work in multiple industries, each with its own preferred viewing format," said William M. Gascoigne, CoCreate CEO. "Lightweight viewers have become especially important as so many designers now work with teams that may include several internal departments and external partners-many of whom may not have compatible CAD systems, or even CAD expertise."

"XVL breaks the mold with a technology shift," says Ken Versprille, Ph.D., PLM Research Director, CPD Associates, LLC (CPDA). "Rather than rely on representing product graphics in a tessellated form of planar triangles, XVL uses a higher mathematical surface form allowing for impressive data compression. Less data drives faster data transfer and faster data transfer drives expanded use of that data for collaborating design teams and downstream users of product data."

CoCreate will release the Lattice3D viewing component as an XVL Converter module for Designer Modeling through a service pack to Designer Modeling later this year. The add-on module will be available for purchase at that time through CoCreate resellers and account executives. With the module, Designer Modeling users can export their 3D CAD designs to XVL, a popular, lightweight 3D graphics format.

These smaller 3D files (typically compressed to ~2% the size of the original model) can then be easily shared via email. Recipients use a free XVL Player, a small downloadable plug-in for both Internet Explorer and Netscape, to view the file.

"Lightweight viewing strengthens collaboration during the design process by bringing knowledge from all parts of the organization into a product's development," said Alex Garcia-Tobar CEO, Lattice3D. "With Lattice3D's XVL format companies also achieve productivity gains from the re-use of 3D CAD design data in downstream activities across every part of a product's lifecycle, resulting in cycle time and cost reductions as well as quality improvements and a better customer experience."

"The world is not a homogeneous place," said Gascoigne. "People must work today with others who have different technologies, different interests, and different needs. Our goal is to provide a best-in-class CAD solution, while accommodating different standards and technologies in industry. We started by making it easy to import and export data from major CAD systems into Designer Modeling. The popular XVL format and other lightweight viewing formats extend the reach of Designer Modeling data to non-CAD users in downstream processes, to partners and to suppliers."

Additional capabilities to re-use and share your 3D data assets across the enterprise (in ultra-compressed XVL format) are available via Lattice3D Applications from Lattice3D resellers and OEMs. These capabilities include 3D part catalogue systems, 3D training animations, 3D QA applications, 3D technical manuals and even 3D web sites.

About CoCreate

CoCreate's flexible CAD and collaborative PLM applications enable manufacturers to take advantage of changes within their supply chains and markets. Our software provides the competitive advantage manufacturers need to quickly adapt to new opportunities and gain sustainable top line growth. Our mechanical CAD product, Designer Modeling, is for designers who need freedom to create and change 3D designs without misunderstandings or delay. Model Manager, a data management product, is for teams who can't afford to work on the wrong revision of a 3D CAD model or 2D drawing when creating assemblies. OneSpace.net collaboration software is for project teams who are overwhelmed by the complexity of a design process that stretches across sites, contractors, or outsourced teams. We help teams design products, manage CAD data, and share ideas so they can reach their time-to-market goals. 

www.cocreate.com

About Lattice

Lattice3D's award-winning solutions increase efficiency, lower costs, and improve product and service quality. Lattice3D is a privately-held company founded in 1997 and is headquartered in Silicon Valley and Tokyo. The company has offices worldwide and works with resellers in 91 countries. 

www.lattice3d.com