UGS looks at varsities to ready CAD-CAM experts

UGS Corp, a global provider of product lifecycle management (PLM) software and services, is looking at opening centres of excellence in various universities for disseminating knowledge on CAD usage and for churning out skilled resources.

The company also plans to offer certification to enhance proficiency of professionals in software usage.

"We are approaching universities to establish centres of excellence which can be focal points for disseminating CAD usage for various colleges affiliated to that particular varsity," Vivek Marwaha, country marketing manager, UGS told Business Standard.

The company launched a technical training manual on computer-aided engineering drawing in association with the Visvesvaraya Technological University (VTU).

Presently, UGS runs a centre of excellence at the VTU campus in Belgaum. Marwaha said that the centres of excellence will serve as centres of `training the trainers', exposing the faculty to training students on various aspects of CAD-CAM-CAE.

"We want to replicate the model across universities to create a talent pool for the requirements of the industry. UGS will provide the tool and technology to these varsities to allign their courses to the requirements of the industry," Marwaha added.

Besides the varsities, UGS is also looking at private training service providers to update their courses to meet industry requirements. The company has tied up with CAD Centre, a provider of CAD education.

"While the adoption by the industry is high, the availability of skilled resources to use advanced technology is low. We are in talks with private training providers to partner them in offering training programmes in tune with the industry requirements," said Marwaha.

UGS, which had revenues of $1.15 billion last calendar, is looking at India not only as a big market, but also as a technical competency base. The company has a development centre in Pune and a competency centre for PLM implementation in Bangalore.

"India is the fastest growing country for the company as far as users' revenue from different countries are concerned. India is right now at the centrestage for the company, not just from the sales and support point of view, but for the technology expertise. The whole organisation is looking at investing in India more aggressively.