Arlington, Texas, October 30, 2001 - ASPire3D, the Application Service Provider Internet portal from Imagecom, Inc., announced today that it was developing a suite of products that will enable what they are calling Enhanced Flexible Collaboration in the engineering supply chain. ASPire3D is already the world leader in automated 2D to 3D CAD conversions using their premier award-winning FlexiDesign technology that powers their ASP portal.

This Enhanced Flexible Collaboration is based on two new technologies. The first component is an automated feature exchanger system that will translate parametric feature-rich 3D models created in one CAD system to any other CAD system. The second technology component enables a revolutionary new concept by allowing manufacturers and designers to collaborate, in real time, on feature-based models with bi-directional associativity. This technology will allow designers and manufacturers to collaborate more effectively by allowing them to evaluate the manufacturability and cost of a product early in the design phase.

These two technologies complement ASPire3D’s mature technology that automatically converts 2D drawings to feature-based parametric 3D models. This is valuable in collaboration because many new designs are modifications to legacy designs available only in 2D.

ASPire3D’s collaborative environment is quite different from others available today because it is real-time synchronous using heterogeneous CAD systems. This means each collaborator has the ability to work on their individual CAD system of choice and yet be able to intelligently share feature-based product data with other collaborators. All data translation among collaborators within and between design and manufacturing groups is accomplished through ASPire3D’s breakthrough technology called the Universal Feature Object (UFO). While other vendors have recently introduced feature-based interoperability solutions, ASPire3D is the only one that will offer real-time collaboration, bi-directional associativity and a migration plan for 2D drawings.

The above plug and play modules will be packaged with a customer’s existing collaboration environment, or will be customized with ASPire3D’s choice of collaboration system for companies that have no existing collaboration infrastructure.

Commenting on the new product development, Dr. Raj Ganesan, Chief Technology Officer for ASPire3D said, “our latest Enhanced Flexible Collaboration technology components continue our ongoing vision to remove all interoperability barriers found in design and manufacturing. This idea started seven years ago and the fruit of our initial research was our 2D to 3D conversion product. When completed, these new products will propel ASPire3D into a new market space with far reaching impact on both design and manufacturing.” He added, “a new ASP featuring some of these products will be released later this year, while the enterprise software versions of these products will be available Q1 2002.”

Mr. Joe Greco, a leading MCAD analyst commented, “I had the chance to preview this new technology and found it to be very impressive. This is feature-based interoperability taken to entire new level, where real-time translation makes true design and manufacturing collaboration a fact, not a possibility.”

Editors, writers and analysts whose focus is the CAD market are welcome to experience ASPire3D’s Enhanced Flexible Collaboration by contacting Dr. Ganesan at 817-299-5404 or Raj.Ganesan@aspire3d.com in order to set up a WebEx demo.

About ASPire3D

ASPire3D is an Application Service Provider portal from Imagecom, Inc., a privately held company located at Arlington, Texas. Imagecom is a developer of automated representation conversion software products that enable enhanced flexible collaboration in the engineering supply chain. 2Dto3DCAD.com is powered by Imagecom’s premier FlexiDesign technology and is featured on ASPire3D. For more information contact Imagecom at (817) 299-5400 or visit their website at http://www.ASPire3D.com or http://www.aspire3d.com.