Computer-Aided Engineering (CAE)-a technique designed to predict and solve potential problems in products which may arise in prototypes and production processes-is widely used in R&D, product development, production engineering, and prototyping at Canon. CAE combines "prototype-less core technology" with actual product analysis and measurement technologies. It helps accelerate development cycles, reduce costs, and enhance product performance, functionality, and quality.

Virtual prototyping relies primarily on three techniques: 3-D Digital Mockup Review (DMR) to identify problems in a basic product configuration using 3-D data, Computer-Aided Manufacturing (CAM) to automatically generate processing data, and CAE.
For CAE, the core of the three techniques mentioned above, Canon is working to transform virtual prototyping from a means of verifying prototype replacement to a means of proposing improvements in the design phase, which takes full advantage of optimization analysis (CAO: Computer-Aided Optimization), multi-object optimization analysis, and robust optimization analysis for stable functionality and performance.

Progress of CAE Technology

For the zoom lens barrel pictured here, Canon performed multi-objective optimization analyses targeting two parameters-zoom lens drive time and power consumption, which have a tradeoff relationship-and derived a set of optimal Pareto solutions. From this set, the engineer decided on a solution that made it possible to reduce the zoom lens drive time by two-thirds while at the same time reducing power consumption.