Today is another very exciting day for ANSYS – we have completed our acquisition of Esterel Technologies, a leading provider of solutions that simulate the behavior of embedded software code. Our joint solution will enable customers to gain greater insight into the behavior of the embedded software as it interacts with the overall product – including electrical, mechanical and fluidic subsystems. This combination will accelerate development and delivery of innovative products — smart products — to the marketplace.

How do smart products get smart?  Some of it comes from the design; a lot of it comes from intelligence that’s functionally built in — largely captured in the software that helps control and work with the microprocessors and all the electronics inside it.

Embedded software is the control code built into the electronics in aircraft, rail transportation, automobiles, energy systems, medical devices and other industry products that have central processing units. For example, today’s complex systems, like aircraft and automobiles, can have tens of millions of lines of embedded software code for cockpit displays, engine controls and driver assistance systems. Think about it: We now have airplanes that can fly themselves. Industrial utility grids can react to different kinds of environments, in the way that wind turbines adapt to weather conditions. And there are all kinds of electronics that we take for granted: smartphones and tablets, to name a few. These all have embedded smart capabilities.

But all the components in a smart product have to work together at the systems level for it to be successful. And the interaction of components is very complex. No one will say, “Yes, it had the best circuit board,” or “Yes, it had the best embedded software.” Instead, people will say, “This product is really great, it’s going to fly off the shelves.” Or the converse.

To achieve smart-product integrity at that systems level, you have to have great software (a byproduct of Esterel simulations) as well as great mechanical, structural and electronic designs (which traditionally have come from ANSYS virtual engineering). Now that Esterel has joined the ANSYS family, we can integrate these separate aspects. We can help our customers continue to create the next generation of game-changing products. The ability of ANSYS and Esterel to coordinate on these types of endeavors is virtually limitless.

Eric Bantegnie, Founder of Esterel

Please join us in warmly welcoming our 110 new colleagues in France, China, Germany, India, UK, Russia and the United States.

You can learn more about the fundamental DNA that is driving our combined company by watching this video. And stay tuned — there’s always more to come as we take engineering simulation technology to the next level.