A Computer Aided Design Software Comparative Study with Applications in Industry 4.0 – Smart Manufacturing

The concept Industry 4.0 implies many elements such as CAD/CAM/CAE, simulation, additive fabrication, IoT (internet of things) and it was a result of the demands of the industry in decreasing the period of product designing, flexibility of the design, and quick response to the market demands.. With the help of CAD software, the design period for a new product was reduced by almost 30 percent. Based on this reason, the CAD software family was developed during the last twenty years giving the possibility to create more complex 3D models, parametrization and calculus for product cost or mechanical properties. One of the major drawback in having such a great number of companies that produce CAD software is that each one tries to individualize their own software. We can mention that there are over 150 types of CAD files format. This multitude of types of CAD software makes it necessary to carry out a comparative study to establish criteria for choosing one software or another. In this article we carried out such a study considering three of the most used software based on a case study – the design of a turning cutting tool.