PLM developer Dassault Systèmes is far from giving up the fight to remain one of the leaders in automotive PLM. After recent setbacks for Dassault, where Volvo Group and South Korea's Hyundai KIA Motors both decided to phase out Dassault’s CAD software CATIA, today we see the news that Renault Group is doing the exact opposite and going all-in on Dassault's PLM platform, 3DEXPERIENCE, where CATIA is one of the apps.

Renault announced yesterday that it is "strengthening its 20-year collaboration with a new partnership" with Dassault based on the latter's 3DEXPERIENCE platform. This will be used as a basis for Renault Group's plans to establish PLM in the cloud.

It's a remarkably big step to take: Renault Group will distribute 3DEXPERIENCE on the cloud platform to more than 20,000 employees in vehicle development functions such as design, engineering, industrial process technology, purchase of parts and materials, costing and quality.

In the automotive sphere, Renault is probably the first player to drive the use of 3DEXPERIENCE as far as today's news suggests. If the whole thing is realized, Renault will also take the step from a mixed V5/V6 platform to a pure cloud and V6 environment.

But taking this step is far from a walk in the park. There are previous examples, which engineering.com has reported on in a series of articles about Jaguar Land Rover, which made a similar investment. the JLR results have not been entirely successful, since the implementation of the 3DEXPERIENCE-based PLM platform has taken a long time.

Renault on 3DEXPERIENCE in the Cloud. Renault Group will distribute the platform with 3DEXPERIENCE in the cloud to more than 20,000 employees in vehicle development functions such as design, product technology, industrial process technology, purchase of parts and materials, cost calculation and quality. Connected to the cloud, the platform will provide access to the same system and software, 3D modeling and simulations, updated in real time worldwide.

A Diversified Software Environment

On the other hand, Renault has so far been relatively consistent in its investment, which can be characterized as a cautious step-by-step approach of solution introductions based on the V6 platform. For example, they have worked with the CAD software CATIA in a mixed V5/V6 solution in what is a fairly diversified environment.

In 2019 Renault announced that it had invested in Aras PLM and its Innovator platform. The idea was to use Innovator to handle software configurations that were to be distributed over the French car producer’s network. The choice was interesting for several reasons, not least because Renault generally used—and still is using—a lot of Dassault’s software, especially CATIA V5 on the CAD side. But as mentioned above, they have also worked for several years towards the 3DEXPERIENCE platform and the V6 environment, with ENOVIA as product data backbone.

Aras commented on this investment, saying that, "they [Renault] need a PLM system that is flexible enough to handle high-level configurations and full traceability over the life cycle." Traceability is thus one of the key capabilities in Renault’s configuration management, which also was accentuated in today’s press material on the new 3DEXPERIENCE in the cloud deal. Whether the Aras investment worked as intended is unclear today.

Moreover, an announcement stating that Renault has adopted the 3DEXPERIENCE platform is not new. As recently as 2016, Renault announced that the 3DEXPERIENCE platform—which is the foundation of the company's NewPDM program—had 10,000 users within the Renault Group, which also included Dacia and Renault Samsung Motors.

On the collaboration side, Renault is also working on a Swedish-developed solution for collaboration: Eurostep's ShareAspace Nova platform. This involves, among other things, sharpening the exchange of CAD and PDM data in the internal development work.

“The First of Its Kind”

It is not difficult to agree with what is written in the press material from Renault and Dassault: “In a first of its kind for an industrial company of this scale, Renault Group uses the Dassault Systèmes 3DEXPERIENCE platform on the cloud globally to develop programs for new vehicles and mobility services. "

“Our decision to use the 3DEXPERIENCE platform in the cloud shows our belief in the leading role for engineering and digital work in the strategic initiative we call, ‘Renalution.’ It is about our change towards becoming a technology, service and energy company that is collaboration-based,” commented Luca de Meo, CEO of Renault Group. “The 3DEXPERIENCE platform connects engineering to all disciplines in a digital company. We will have the agility, speed and efficiency to develop new mobility faster than ever before.”

“It is about our change towards becoming a technology, service and energy company that is collaboration-based,” commented Luca de Meo, CEO of Renault Group.

New Technologies and Online Connection Drive the Development

Furthermore, it is noted that this corporate platform, 3DEXPERIENCE, will "give Renault a new backbone to share in real time all product-related data throughout the product lifecycle and to manage the virtual (digital) twins in its various product configurations."

The background to this dramatic step, as Renault points out, is important technological and regulatory trends, particularly those being driven by e-mobility and general electrification of the world's vehicle fleet.

Another factor is the growing part of the software and related development work, as well as the online trend where all vehicles are connected.

Overall, we are talking about increasing regulatory constraints, product complexity, electrification, connectivity, sustainability and new mobility services. All of this requires accelerating the interconnection of different functions and expertise within an agile and collaborative ecosystem. Renault hits exactly right and acts with today's decisions consistently in a direction where it provides the organization with the tools needed.

20,000 Employees on the Platform

As stated above, Renault Group will distribute the platform with 3DEXPERIENCE in the cloud to more than 20,000 employees in vehicle development functions such as design, product technology, industrial process technology, purchase of parts and materials, cost calculation and quality. Connected to the cloud, the platform will provide access to the same system and software, 3D modeling and simulations, updated in real time worldwide.

The large-scale collaboration will also be based on digital twins, and it is claimed, "will improve data sharing between the various functions and flexibility within the company, while reducing costs and vehicle development time by about one year."

“We are fully committed to this partnership and to supporting Renault Group's successes,” says Dassault Systèmes CEO, Bernard Charlès.

"A Leverage Against Sustainability," says Bernard

The head of Dassault, Bernard Charlès, further pointed out that Renault Group will benefit from continuous technical developments and functional enrichment of the collaboration on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform in the cloud.

“Sustainable innovation lies in the DNA of both companies. Renault Group's transformation will radically change the mobility industry in the future, much like the first virtual development of a commercial passenger aircraft did for all industries in 1989. We are fully committed to this partnership and to supporting Renault Group's success,” said Charlès.

He also noted that today's industrial ecosystems are no longer linear, but circular.

“Innovation requires new collaboration strategies with virtual twin experiences that address and include the entire value chain during development. When Renault Group moves to a corporate platform, our partnership confirms that the 3DEXPERIENCE platform goes beyond creating and manufacturing vehicles. It is a lever to drive the industry towards the delivery of new, sustainable mobility experiences,” he says. In Dassault's language, they always say "virtual" not digital twins.

Renault Group relies on four industry solutions from Dassault Systèmes, based on the 3DEXPERIENCE platform on the cloud:

On-Target Vehicle Launch
Smart, Safe & Connected
Global Modular Architecture
Efficient Multi-Energy Platform

Bernard Works Hard to Catch “The New Generation Train”

How this will all end up remains to be seen. The news from Renault and Dassault also comes interestingly and strikingly close to the recent massive news flow around major automotive players who have chosen to phase out Dassault Systèmes solutions.

For this reason alone, today's message from Renault is a very important signal: Dassault may encounter adversity here and there, but it does not intend to lose the initiative to work diligently to meet market developments when vehicle companies start looking at, ordering and implementing the next generation of CAD and PLM solutions.

Bernard and Dassault want—and intend—to be on the “next generation PLM train.”

It is also an extensive and tough investment Renault is making. The fact that it has taken an extremely long time to establish 3DEXPERIENCE at JLR is an indication that this will not happen overnight. It should be said, however, that JLR made its investment decision when the platform was new, in the early 2010s. Much has improved since then, although the V6 solutions have had a strikingly difficult challenge to establishing themselves in automotive, where the V5 predecessor is still the general rule very often, with Siemens Teamcenter as product data backbone.