Functional Design Becomes a Competitive Advantage for Leading Elevator and Escalator Company LAS VEGAS, Autodesk University, Nov. 27 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Autodesk, Inc. (NASDAQ:ADSK) today announced that KONE Corporation, one of the world's largest providers of elevators and escalators, is successfully integrating 3D into their 2D design processes with Autodesk Inventor software, the world's best-selling 3D mechanical design software product. Leveraging the powerful 3D capabilities of Autodesk Inventor lets KONE focus on Functional Design, the creation of designs based on the functional requirements of a project. As a result, function drives form, and the company can move more quickly from concept to reality with designs that work right the first time. As one of the world's top elevator and escalator manufacturers, KONE offers a full range of services, from design and installation to maintenance and modernization. KONE's escalator modernization team specializes in solutions that allow building owners to update their existing escalators at a significantly lower cost than a total replacement. On these complex jobs, all of the escalators' mechanical and electrical components are removed while keeping the structural framework intact. This allows for quick installation of the latest escalator technology, modernizing a building's vertical transportation resources without causing major disruption to the customer. KONE had historically done most of its modernization design work in 2D. The company saw the advantages it could gain by integrating 3D design into these modernization projects, where the constant challenge is to incorporate a universal product into many different brands, models and types of escalators. "The Functional Design features in Autodesk Inventor, such as the Frame Generator and Design Accelerator, let us generate parts and assemblies based on functional requirements and real-world parameters," said Don Gradin, a mechanical designer for KONE. "That helps us maximize the commonality and interchangeability of parts, which minimizes design time and reduces field installation hours due to improper component fit. Most importantly, this helps us get new escalators up and running quicker for our customers." Autodesk Inventor, which provides support for both 2D and 3D design environments, was the ideal solution for KONE, a company that had a great deal of legacy data in AutoCAD software files. Additionally, the overall user- friendliness of the Inventor product assured that KONE was able to rapidly start realizing the benefits of 3D design. "The operational simplicity of Autodesk Inventor -- especially compared to some other 3D packages -- created a quick ramp-up to proficiency, even for inexperienced operators," said Gradin. "Today, all of our designs are released to production with a full set of 2D drawings generated from Inventor 3D models. Switching between 2D and 3D is effortless. Since all of our parts and assemblies need to be modeled anyway, there is very little additional engineering time required, and we experience a significant time reduction in drawing preparation." In addition to saving time, Autodesk Inventor 3D designs allow for easier visualization of solutions, which helps in both conceptualizing and brainstorming. This creative advantage assures that KONE stays on the cutting edge of design for its customers. "To stay competitive in today's marketplace, manufacturers have to increase engineering productivity without sacrificing innovation," said Robert "Buzz" Kross, vice president of Autodesk Manufacturing Solutions. "By using Autodesk Inventor 3D functionality and a functional design approach to their work process today's manufacturers are better able to realize their ideas and easily achieve both goals."
