"U.S. automaker Ford cut design and engineering work that used to take 40 hours to 4 hours by using AI-based simulation. Ultimately, by using AI, it will become possible to complete the same work in 4 minutes, and further, in 4 seconds."
Michelle Ash, CEO of Dassault Systèmes Simulia, said on the 11th at the Dassault Systèmes Simulia User Day 2026 held at the Westin Seoul Parnas in Gangnam District, Seoul, that advances in AI-based simulation technology will drive manufacturing innovation. Ash said, "In the past, a lot of time was invested to validate a single design, but now we can review and compare 10 design proposals at the same time within the same timeframe," adding, "Through this, corporations can develop higher-quality products more quickly."
On the day, Dassault Systèmes outlined the development path of ModSim, its modeling and simulation solution based on the 3D Experience platform. ModSim supports performing product design and simulation simultaneously in a single environment. When Dassault Systèmes' design software Catia designs a product, the simulation software Simulia immediately verifies how that product will operate in the real world. According to Dassault Systèmes, this can cut product development time by up to 90% and reduce expense by more than 8%.
Ash said, "Because simulation is carried out while designing the product, we can experiment with more ideas and review diverse options from the early stages of development, ultimately enabling faster product development," adding, "For example, Ford adopted ModSim and succeeded in cutting work that used to take 40 hours to 4 hours."
She also predicted that combining AI with ModSim could fundamentally change how products are developed. Ash said, "Dassault Systèmes is investing in AI at scale and integrating an AI world model across the ModSim platform and simulation solvers (analysis engines)," adding, "AI-based simulation will dramatically boost productivity by helping engineers make decisions more quickly."
She emphasized that Dassault Systèmes Simulia is continuously improving its performance for the AI era. Ash said, "Our core simulation solvers have been advanced to be optimized for Nvidia's graphics processing unit (GPU) environment, and as a result, simulation speed has become 3 to 15 times faster than before." She added that the company is also working closely with Nvidia to improve simulation performance while lowering expense.
Dassault Systèmes expects the role of simulation to grow more important in the AI era. Lee Jusang, head of Dassault Systèmes Korea, said, "In the past, simulation was used mainly as a verification tool in the latter stages of product development, but now it has emerged as a core capability that determines corporate competitiveness by predicting product performance early in planning and design and minimizing risks."
Lee added, "In the AI era, simulation goes beyond simple analysis and verification to help engineers break free from repetitive tasks and focus on critical design and verification work."
Dassault Systèmes plans to sequentially unveil additional Simulia features from this year through next year. AI and Machine Learning features and design verification tools will be introduced starting in Jul.
Headquartered in France, Dassault Systèmes is a software company leading 3D CAD (computer-aided design) and AI-based virtual twin technology. A virtual twin is a technology that replicates real factories and manufacturing processes as they are in a virtual space. It creates a "twin" of real-world objects in a virtual space, runs simulations, and uses the results to predict outcomes in advance to optimize products and services.