MSC.Software today announced that Airbus, global manufacturer of commercial and military transport aircraft, extended their strategic partnership with a multi-million dollar agreement. This strategic partnership enables Airbus engineers to utilize a comprehensive range of products from the MSC.Software portfolio under the MSC.MasterKey system. "We are very pleased and honored that Airbus has chosen MSC.Software as its strategic partner for Virtual Product Development (VPD) Solutions," said Bill Weyand, chairman and CEO, MSC.Software. "MSC's SimOffice, which is an open standards based tightly integrated suite of simulation software solutions, coupled with MSC.MasterKey gives Airbus engineers the best of both worlds -- a unique Aerospace solution along with this industry's best licensing system. With the new expanded Alliance Partnership, we are confident that Airbus engineers around the world will realize new levels of functionality, flexibility, and an integrated suite of solvers. We look forward to expanding our long term partnership with Airbus." Since the introduction of the A300 in 1974, Airbus has gained a worldwide reputation for innovation, today producing 13 aircraft models, from the 100-seat A318 jetliner to the 555-seat A380. With enterprise wide, multi- disciplinary simulation requirements, and the lifecycle of aircraft extending for decades, engineers at Airbus require a broad and integrated virtual product development solution capable of meeting their needs for years to come. MSC.MasterKey is a flexible solution for manufacturing organizations requiring single source access to a diverse range of VPD solutions. MSC.MasterKey allows customers to replace individual product licenses with software tokens, providing access to multiple simulation software tools, on demand. The agreement concludes an extensive technology and business value evaluation, and Airbus engineers across Europe will benefit from a full range of stand-alone and CAD-embedded simulation tools from the SimOffice and SimDesigner product suites. "Strong, close, and long-term partnerships with enterprise level organizations such as Airbus are central to our philosophy of customer driven product development, and highly targeted service delivery. The extension of our relationship with Airbus is a further confirmation of the business benefits which MSC.Software products, licensed via MSC.MasterKey, bring to the global aerospace market," Amir Mobayen, MSC.Software, Senior VP, EMEA (Europe, Middle-East & Africa).