Multi-component CAD assembly prep for simulation teams

The moment that drives someone here is opening a 60-component CAD assembly in their simulation preprocessor and realizing that surfaces are missing, components aren't identifiable, and there's no clean way to isolate, rename, or re-associate geometry before meshing. The specific complaint: 'it becomes difficult to identify components for models with multiple components, and sometimes it will not take all surfaces from the CAD file.' This is a pre-processing data quality problem that happens before the solver ever runs — and it's invisible to the simulation vendor's support team because users work around it manually and rarely file tickets, they just spend the time.

The reason this stays broken is that simulation preprocessors are designed around solver setup, not around assembly data management. The CAD import pipeline is treated as a hand-off problem — 'if the CAD is clean, it'll import fine' — which puts the burden entirely on the engineer to fix geometry upstream, usually in a full CAD package they may not be licensed to use deeply.

In practice, users are missing section clipping, measurement tools, and quick remodeling capability — all things you'd need to audit and fix a multi-component assembly before setting up contacts and mesh regions. Without a focused tool, an engineer spends hours manually cross-referencing the CAD tree, renaming bodies, and re-importing until all surfaces appear. That work recurs on every new assembly, every design revision, and every time a supplier sends an updated component file — which is to say, constantly. The recurring nature is what makes this a business: it's not a one-time cleanup, it's the first 20% of every simulation project.

What to build

Build a CAD assembly auditor that ingests multi-body STEP or Parasolid files, flags missing or duplicate surfaces, lets engineers rename and re-associate components, clip cross-sections with measurement output, and exports a simulation-ready assembly file with a log of all changes made.

Where to start

Start with automotive Tier 1 suppliers who receive weekly geometry updates from OEMs — they have a predictable, high-frequency version of this problem on a fixed release cycle, which makes ROI easy to calculate and makes the product a repeating workflow fixture rather than an occasional utility.

The hard part

Getting the first customer means convincing a team to add one more tool to a file-handling workflow they've already jury-rigged into something that technically works — the switching cost is low but so is the perceived urgency, since the pain is distributed across hours rather than concentrated in a single visible failure.

How it makes money

Annual team license priced per concurrent user, with a free tier capped at 5-component assemblies to drive adoption among individual analysts who then request budget for a team seat.