MSC.Software today announced an alliance with NVIDIA to leverage the CUDA architecture of its Tesla graphics processing units (GPUs) in a way that will transform simulation-driven product design and development, providing computer-aided engineering (CAE) analysts with dramatically faster results.

MSC.Software's finite element analysis (FEA) software, known as Marc, has demonstrated performance gains, with Tesla GPUs, of up to 5x for typical complex models compared with the latest dual-core CPUs.

"Our customers will achieve new levels of simulation fidelity and product innovation using this breakthrough technology," said Ash Munshi, CEO of MSC.Software. "This successful collaboration with NVIDIA is the beginning of an alliance that will ultimately add value across a broad range of simulation products from MSC.Software."

In addition to dramatic speed ups, NVIDIA GPUs offer significantly greater compute density, so that typical simulation times require just a few GPUs as opposed to tens of CPUs. This advantage provides significant cost advantages in hardware savings, but also substantial reductions in power consumption and space requirements.

"Whether an organization is designing an aircraft or power tool, simulation is the bottle neck in the design and development process, taking days or even weeks to complete," said Monica Schnitger, president of CAE market analyst Schnitger Corp. "Manufacturers are increasingly turning to GPUs to speed their processes, turning week-long computations into days and days into hours."