In the Industry 4.0 environment, engineers often face completely new challenges in developing products. They have to assemble the entire, usually highly complex mechatronic system for a product solution, including the structure, sensors, actuators, controls and a whole lot more, to create a fully functional whole. That's why Altair Engineering GmbH - based in Böblingen, Germany - is at HANNOVER MESSE 2017 to present solutions and methods for simulation-led innovation and is using technological demonstrations and customer examples to show how these solutions and methods can be successfully harnessed to develop innovative products.

The company is using a virtual collaborative robot (Cobot) to demonstrate the challenges in developing smart devices, and at the same time is showing ways of tackling these. The HyperWorks environment, for example, can be used to simulate and adapt the Cobot’s connectivity, to scan the environment using sensors, and to control and regulate drives and their efficiency System simulation is also deployed in load calculations for topology optimization, enabling the creation of lightweight structures using organic design. These structures are ultimately key to the excellent efficiency, high levels of precision and the necessary occupational safety.