What CAD software do aerospace and automotive companies use?
As an engineering student, I'm learning how to use and become certified in SolidWorks. While SolidWorks is great and very useful, I don't imagine it is powerful enough for companies like Boeing or Ford or BMW to find useful. So, what kind of CAD/CAM software do companies like this use? Do they also use different kinds of software to visualize and simulate their designs?
My friends who studied aerospace engineering ended up using Solidworks with Boeing and Sikorsky along with finite element analysis software like SolidCast and SCADA.
As for automotive, that is a different ball game. You need to study Automotive Engineering (Offered in very few schools, most of them in Michigan), and Industrial Design (offered in few schools - Less than 50 in the US I think). They are taught software's that are unknown to other engineering fields. On the automotive engineering side, they can use Solidworks, Solidcast, and Scada, but they have dedicated automotive mechanical design software. And Industrial Designers have dedicated automotive design software. I know Rhino is one of those software's but I'm not sure how popular Rhino is in industry. There's also AutoDesk Inventor, Siemens NX, etc.
If you want to be taught Solidworks, study Mechanical or Industrial or Aerospace Engineering.
If you want to be taught AutoCAD, study any engineering except bio related, chemical engineering, or computer/software engineering.
If you want to be taught finite element software like Solidcast or simulation software's like Rockwell Arena and Matlab Simulink, study Industrial Engineering. Note: Mechanical engineers also learn Matlab in most schools.
If you want to be taught finite element softwares like Matlab Simulink or SCADA, study electrical engineering or systems engineering.
If you want automotive related specific software's, study Automotive Engineering. My wife worked with Volvo Powertrain and said that they do not use much Solidworks for automotive design.
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