Manufacturer shaves weeks off design times migrating CAD to Onshape and AWS

Formlabs, a manufacturer of 3D printers and post-processing systems for production and rapid prototyping, shaved weeks off development timelines by migrating its on-premises computer-aided design (CAD) software to the Onshape CAD and data management platform on Amazon Web Services (AWS). As the company grew, the time and money required to maintain its on-premises system got in the way of teams’ productivity and their ability to bring new ideas to market. Moving to Onshape and AWS eliminated infrastructure management and provided new tools for improved collaboration. As a result, Formlabs experienced fewer errors caused by CAD revision management, better real-time collaboration and innovation, and productive new hires starting day one—without incurring additional IT overhead.

Companies from top automotive, consumer products, and electronics groups use Formlabs’ 3D printers and post-processing systems to build and test prototypes that drive new product releases. These global organizations spend millions of dollars developing new ideas and getting them to market as quickly as possible. Formlabs helps them eke out advantages over their competitors by continuously rolling out new features and enhancements that lead to faster and better prototyping processes. However, Formlabs’ own product R&D involved an on-premises CAD system which took increasingly more time and money to maintain as the company grew, causing unnecessary friction for new products and feature releases. “We were at the whim of the servers,” says Adam Lebovitz, Mechanical Engineer at Formlabs.  

Formlabs migrated to the Onshape CAD and data management platform on AWS. The software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution uses a unique cloud database and fileless architecture to help remote access from anywhere and eliminate PC configuration and server management/updates. By running AWS, Onshape can push updates to Formlabs every three weeks—much faster and more reliably than the old process which involved touching every machine and server on-premises. The move to the fully managed CAD services on cloud infrastructure helped the manufacturer shave weeks or months off development cycles, help real-time collaboration from anywhere, and get new hires editing CAD files fast.

Using Onshape, engineers can work on the same CAD model at the same time without having to wait for colleagues to check in files, which improves collaboration. The solution tracks every design change and eliminates version control issues, allowing Formlabs team members to instantly revert to earlier designs if they wish. Lebovitz and his colleagues have more confidence in their work because of Onshape’s reliability. “We catch and fix CAD mistakes more quickly, reducing our stress and increasing our confidence,” he says. “We’ve greatly reduced the hassle and expense of receiving a manufactured part only to find that the part was manufactured based on out-of-date CAD files. I find myself doing much less re-ordering and reworking due to CAD software issues.”  

“With Onshape and AWS, we simply work differently than we used to,” says Lebovitz of Formlabs, which has offices in the US, Europe, and Asia. “Designers and developers can look at each other’s progress and see changes they’re making to the design from wherever they are. They can explore those changes in real time and quickly provide feedback. That means smaller and more frequent review cycles.”

This real-time, collaboration-from-anywhere capability is possible thanks in part to the highly available, highly secure AWS services that address potential risks associated with broader data sharing. Those factors include AWS secure data centers, secure high-speed networking, and additional layered services, such as virtual private clouds, key management service, and encryption. Formlabs gets the benefit of these security factors without having to deploy and manage them in its own environment.
“It’s comforting to know that Onshape runs on AWS,” says Lebovitz. “AWS has always been reliable for us. It gives me a high level of confidence in what is for us a truly mission-critical solution.”