There are many reasons why manufacturing companies outsource their CAD/Engineering design work.

  • Faster time to market the product or machine.
  • Reduced cost of product or machine by minimizing the engineering cost.
  • Core Engineering Team of the company can focus on Technology and the other activities can be outsourced less critical work to Engineering Service Company.
  • Engineering Services Company can work as an extended design office.
  • Hiring of Engineering Resource for shorter duration can be avoided.
  • Difficulty in hiring suitable expertise in a short span of time.
  • Hiring expertise may be expensive
  • Not having enough CAD licenses

Benefits of Outsourcing:

  1. Speed of Deployment: Outsourcing can be an immediate solution for hot projects to kick off the project within a month. Outsourced engineering services afford a quicker time to market and lower overall costs.
  1. Focus: Outsourcing the project help you to focus on the Project requirements, Critical activities, and deadlines. Otherwise, your engineers get disturbed with multiple projects and doing maintenance engineering. The company has the option what activities they can focus inside and what activities they can outsource. So the manufacturing company has focus and easy to achieve milestones.
  1. Knowledge Transfer: Engineering Services Companies follow the well-defined process and do documentation on training to ensure attrition not impact the existing customer.
  1. Consistency in results: Engineering Services Companies provide sustainable intellectual property and best transfer for core knowledge than hiring internal staff and training. They also depute engineers to client location till the project completion. Engineering Services Companies monitor and document engineering hours better than in-house engineering as they need to get approval for every hour they spent.
  1. Vast Exposure : Engineering Services Companies are exposed to a vast array of industries, projects, and companies, so with their experience they bring best practices to your company and your project which help in your project to get the optimal solution. They may find a manufacturing solution or assembly solution or CAD solution which may save time, money or implementing a process to suit to your requirements.

Guidelines for choosing the Engineering Services Provider:

  1. How long are they in the Industry? Their presence in globe.
  2. Current and Past Clientele and their feedback (ask them to share if not confidential)
  3. Do they have well defined Outsourcing process?
  4. Data Security and Confidentiality
    • Manned Security
    • Fire Wall
    • Non-Disclosure Agreement
  5. Core Knowledge
    • Engineering Drawing
    • Angle of Projections – 1st& 3rd Angle Method
    • Geometric Dimensioning & Tolerencing (GD&T)
    • Tolerance Stack-up Analysis

    Unit System

    • Imperial
    • Metric

    Manufacturing Processes and DFMA (Design for Manufacturing and Assembly)

    • Casting
    • Forging
    • Machining
    • Sheet Metal
    • Tolerance Analysis
  6. International Standards
    • ASME/ANSI
  7. Infrastructure/Communication facilities
    • International Calling
    • Web Conference
    • Video Conference
  8. CAD Tool Application. What are the platforms familiar with?
    • AutoCAD
    • Inventor
    • SolidWorkse
    • CATIA
    • NX/Unigraphics
    • Pro Engineer/Creoe
    • Sketchu
    • Solidedge
    • Ansys
  9. FEA/CAE.What type of Analysis can be performed?
    • Structural Analysis
      • Linear & Non-Linear Static Analysis
      • Dynamic Analysis – Modal, Harmonic & Transient
      • Spectrum Analysis
      • Buckling Analysis
    • Thermal Analysis
    • CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics
  10. What Data Management and Product Life Cycle Management Software the company is familiar?
    • Solidworks Enterprise PDMs
    • PDM Works
    • Adept
    • Wildfire
    • Teamcenter
  11. What Services is the Engineering Services Company Offering?
    • CAD Data Migration
    • 2D Drafting
    • 3D Modeling
    • CAD Customization/Design Automation
    • Product Design/Industrial Machine Design
    • Reverse Engineering
    • Re-Engineering
    • Jigs & Fixture Design
    • Press tools and Forging Die Design
    • Value analysis / Value engineering (VA/VE)
    • Finite Element Analysis (FEA)
    • Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)
    • 3D Animation and Rendering
    • Electrical and Controls
    • Sustenance Engineering (Engineering Change Order/Management)
    • Technical Publications
  12. Engineering Staff:
    • Diversified Qualifications
      • Diploma Graduate
      • Graduate Engineers
      • Master Graduates in Engineering
    • Certifications
      • CAD Application Certification
      • Certified SOLID WORKS Professional (CSWP)
      • Inventor Certified Professional
    • PMP (Project Management Professional
  13. Office Timings
    • Time Zone Advantagen
    • Quick Turn Around Time (TAT)
    • Official Working Hours
      • 24/7
      • 18/7
      • 18/5s
  14. Quality Management System (QMS)
    • ISO 9001:2015
    • Kaizen
    • Poka Yoke
    • Six Sigma
  15. What type of Engagement Models?
    • Project to Project (P2P) – Time and Material (T&M) based
    • Full-Time Engagement (FTE) – Dedicated Team – Offshore/Onsite
  16. What Industries the Engineering Services Company serving
    • Automotive
    • Transport & Railroad
    • Aviation
    • Energy& Power
    • Oil & Gas5
    • Semiconductor
    • Metals &Mining
    • Industrial
    • Machine Tools
    • Food & Beverage
  17. Manufacturing Services/Support
    • Machining
    • Casting
    • Forging
    • Assembly

About Author
Kumara Swamy, Senior Manager-Techno Commercial
Kumara Swamy has 20+ years of experience in Engineering Services. He caters engineering challenges with ease and performs well defined procedures to bring cost effective products in reduced time to market. His contributions are primarily focussed on Project Management, Skill development, Quality Management System, Sales and Marketing.

Please contact us at info@totaloutsource.com for any support on  Mechanical Engineering Services.