Sincerely,
Mairi"

In addition to sales, RAND Worldwide, which is a leading global provider of engineering solutions and Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) services and solutions, will be responsible for marketing, collateral material development, documentation, and packaging of the software. The Company will also provide users with complete implementation support, including curriculum development and training services. RAND Worldwide’s partner, ENGINEERING.com Incorporated, developer and owner of the ENGINEERING.com online resource and business for engineers, will provide e-business support for Boeing as well.

Computer simulations play an essential role in the study of liquids that contain particles of different sizes, which are commonly known as complex fluids. But the two main techniques for the atomistic simulation of liquids - the molecular dynamics technique and the Monte Carlo method - have limitations that greatly reduce their effectiveness.

'The main advantage of the molecular dynamics method - its ability to provide information about dynamical processes - is also its main limitation,' said Erik Luijten, a professor of materials science and engineering at Illinois. 'Many complex fluids contain particles of widely different sizes, which move at vastly different time scales. A simulation that faithfully captures the motions of the faster as well as the slower particles would be impracticably slow.'

Fluids4 solves the Navier-Stokes (N-S) equation for a gas or an incompressible liquid that flows through 3D channels with obstacles. The channel and the obstacles can be arbitrary 3D shapes. Optionally, the channel may be axisymmetric.

Fluids4 can import STL ASCII files created by CAD/CAM software or other 3D graphics programs. So, you can import a duct or obstacle shape instead of editing it with the Fluids4 shape editor. The "slicer" algorithm of Fluids32 converts an STL file in up to 100 slices that define the 3d duct shape.

When preparing a model for a CFD analysis, surfaces need to be closed in order to generate mesh. The process of surface wrapping therefore typically involves taking raw CAD data, closing holes in geometry, joining disconnected surfaces, removing interior and overlapping surfaces. The surface wrapping capability in pro-STAR, the pre- and post-processing package for STAR-CD, automatically ‘shrink-wraps’ a closed surface mesh made of triangles and/or quadrangles onto the geometry. The engineer simply takes the model, which can be an assembly of various sources such as native CAD (CATIA V4, CATIA V5, Unigraphics, Pro/ENGINEER), IGES, STEP AP203 ISO Standard, Parasolid, STL (Stereolythography), VDA-FS and NASTRAN formats and then shrink-wraps the surface.

The two companies also established a collaborative development initiative, which will provide the most versatile and comprehensive simulation capabilities for a wide range of industries, including Automotive, Aerospace, Biomedical, Biodiagnostics, Fuel Cells, Materials, Microfluidics, MEMS, Plasma, and Semiconductor Equipment and Processes.

The transaction was completed on 21 January 2004 and included notably software products together with all intellectual property assets, personnel, and facilities as well as customer base and all related commercial rights.