Products

For more than 25 years, Autodesk has been a trusted partner to architects, designers, and engineers around the world. Our 3D digital modeling tools—for both Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Digital Prototyping (DP)—have further advanced design capability for our customers. These technologies help customers visualize, simulate, and analyze the real-world performance of their designs early in the design process (see below).

These technologies enable customers to optimize and improve their designs before they are built, saving time and money, improving quality and collaboration, fostering innovation, and enabling more sustainable design decisions.

See the Industries section for innovative examples of how our customers are using these technologies for more sustainable design.

Autodesk Products Accelerate Sustainable Design

Increasingly, sustainability defines good design. In a world of limited resources, not only does using water and energy efficiently and optimizing materials use benefit the environment, it also can result in better products.

However, sustainable design requires understanding of a broad range of new factors that many of our customers have not considered in the past, such as energy and water consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, human and ecological health impacts, and materials use to optimize a design.

Our mission is to simplify sustainable design by providing customers with the information and tools they need to make the best decisions possible. The same Autodesk tools that designers use to visualize, simulate, and analyze their ideas can also better enable sustainable design. By making these tools easy to use and affordable, we aim to democratize sustainable design by equipping all companies—not only those on the leading edge of sustainability—with the tools they need to make more sustainable design decisions.

Visualization, Simulation & Analysis

Visualization allows customers to create strikingly realistic images of potential products or projects to inform the development process. For example, an architect can visualize the play of natural daylight in a room and provide clients a virtual walk-through of a home or building to see how it looks before it’s built and explore design alternatives.
Simulation using digital models captures how a product or building will perform in the real world. For example, an automotive company can simulate the performance of alternative engine and body designs to optimize fuel efficiency.
Analysis functionality helps customers analyze and compare different designs. For example, an industrial machinery company can analyze how different parts respond to stress and thereby optimize both the type and amount of material used.

For example, in the architecture, engineering, and construction industry, companies use BIM to create digital models of their designs. With BIM, the information required for sustainable design becomes easily available as a part of the standard design process. See Enabling Sustainable Design in Architecture, Engineering & Construction for more detail.

Similarly, our customers in the manufacturing, automotive, and transportation industries use Digital Prototyping to optimize their designs before they are real. This approach reduces the need for physical prototypes and helps designers optimize energy and materials use, and address other sustainable design parameters. See Enabling Sustainable Design in Manufacturing, Automotive & Transportation for more detail.

In addition to our core products that facilitate sustainable design (see below), we also provide tools specifically targeted at sustainability, such as Autodesk® Green Building Studio® web service, Autodesk® Ecotect™ software, and the Sustainable Materials Assistant.

In the coming years, we will continue to provide the design functionality that customers require to address the world’s sustainability challenges.

The following list describes many of our main products. See the Industries section for innovative examples of how our customers are using this technology for more sustainable design.

AutoCAD®—our flagship product has become a foundation for CAD (computer-aided design) worldwide.
AutoCAD® Civil 3D®—a comprehensive AutoCAD-based application for the design, drafting, and management of a wide range of civil engineering project types.
AutoCAD® Map 3D—an engineering platform for creating and managing spatial data and bridging the gap between CAD and geographic information systems (GIS).
Autodesk® 3ds Max®—customizable and scalable 3D modeling, animation, and rendering software for games, film, and television.
Autodesk® Design Review—enables digital collaboration on design files, reducing printing and shipping costs throughout the project.
Autodesk® Inventor®—a comprehensive set of design tools for creating, visualizing, simulating, and optimizing complete digital prototypes for manufactured products and processes.
Autodesk MapGuide® Enterprise—a platform for distributing spatial information quickly, easily, and cost-effectively on the web.
Autodesk® Topobase™—infrastructure design and management software applications that provide centralized, flexible, and secure access to spatial information.
Autodesk® Utility Design—software to design, engineer, order materials, and estimate costs for residential, commercial, and industrial gas and electric systems.
Revit® Architecture—software for building information modeling.