Altair today announced an investment in Garching, Germany based FluiDyna GmbH, a renowned developer of native GPU-based fluid dynamics and numerical simulation technologies. The companies will collaborate to develop GPU optimized computational fluid dynamics (CFD) applications for classical aerodynamics and multi-phase flows in complex geometries. In addition to a technology roadmap to release a new virtual wind tunnel technology later this year, Altair will be the exclusive worldwide reseller of FluiDyna's ultraFluidX and nanoFluidX CFD technologies.
For computationally intensive disciplines like CFD, FluiDyna's technology to use graphics processing units (GPUs) as massively parallel processors offers the benefits of being less expensive, faster and significantly more energy efficient than central processing units (CPUs). FluiDyna specializes in the development and application of GPU-optimized numerical methods to rapidly solve complex fluid flow and thermodynamics problems. The company's commercial product offerings include ultraFluidX for aerodynamics simulation and nanoFluidX for particle-based fluid dynamics simulation. In addition to reselling ultraFluidX and nanoFluidX, Altair will soon launch and provide access to these technologies through its popular Altair Partner Alliance program to its HyperWorks clients globally.
"FluiDyna's technology and expertise complement Altair's CFD offerings by providing yet another methodology particularly tuned for external aerodynamics, fast computation and our core strength in optimization," said Uwe Schramm, Chief Technical Officer at Altair. "The collaboration between our CAE (HyperWorks) and HPC (PBS Works) development teams with FluiDyna's experts will offer new and exciting opportunities to expand our product portfolio that is taking advantage of GPU-based clusters and supports green computing initiatives."
Based on the Lattice Boltzmann Method, ultraFluidX solves large scale internal and external aerodynamics problems in hours on a single workstation for a broad class of problems including passenger and heavy-duty vehicles as well as for the evaluation of building and environmental aerodynamics. nanoFluidX is a fluid dynamics simulation tool based on the smoothed particle hydrodynamics method to predict the flow in complex geometries with complex motion. For example, it can be used to predict the oiling in powertrain systems with rotating shafts/gears and analyze forces and torques on individual components of the system.
"We are excited to join forces with a strong and like-minded company like Altair, who not only creates leading edge simulation and HPC technologies, but has the domain expertise in their application," said Dr. Thomas Indinger, founder and CEO of FluiDyna GmbH. "Given the suitability of massively parallel hardware (GPUs) for particle-based CFD methods, the technology and expertise from FluiDyna will complement Altair's core strengths and yield positive benefits to our combined customer base."
