GrabCAD Partners With Autodesk


    Estonia-founded GrabCAD just put together a big partnership with Autodesk to bring 2D and 3D editing tools into GrabCAD‘s online platform. The partnership integrates into GrabCAD’s Workbench, where designers and engineers can share CAD to non-technical partners or customers by letting them view the model in 3D in their browser, without heavy software or training involved.

    Now that 2D and 3D editing is added to the browser, users can just use one solution for a good portion of the design process. GrabCAD is also expanding their platform approach by announcing GrabCAD Toolbox, where users can get apps from third party providers, like Autodesk, KeyShot, and Solid Edge.

    Hardi Meybaum, CEO of GrabCAD writes in a letter to their community:

    Engineers can now CREATE inside GrabCAD using Autodesk tools (AutoCAD 360 for 2D creation and Autodesk Fusion360 for 3D creation), and the best part is that engineers don’t need to leave GrabCAD to accomplish that. Everything engineers need is in one place in the Cloud, and we’ll continue to add even more 3rd party CAD applications to GrabCAD Toolbox as they are built.

    I’m not very plugged in to what the needs are for engineers designing machinery with cloud tools, but the response on their blog announcement seems to have been very positive. Autodesk is the major player in this CAD space, who recently also acquired Helsinki-founded Tinkercad.

    Initially, both the 2D and 3D editing will be free for users before they come up with pricing.