Comments on: Top 5 Reasons to Outsource Your Modeling Work

By: hot jennifer aniston

hot jennifer aniston — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 21:04:02 +0000

Outsourcing is the only way to run a company if you work from home.Argue all you want about where you get your people from (US or India) but the fact is, just about everyone needs the help.

By: Sandeep Vatyani

Sandeep Vatyani — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:04:59 +0000

Hello Masha,

Good Post,Approach is realistic and I appreciate you writing skills and way of expressing the thoughts.

By: Andrew Campbell

Andrew Campbell — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 20:15:57 +0000

One of the biggest issue with using outsourcing is that to some extend you have an arms length relationship. One of the advantages of inhouse development is that you can work more collaboratively - but with consultants you will generally have to scope the work carefully and it is generally more challenging to change it along the way. Some of the smarter companies around may import the expertiese or second the experience into a project team.

In a lot of the work that I have been involved with, the clients (some internal and external) get most out of “the journey” in terms of the model development and validation. In some ways the value of the in house developments is not well recognised due to the intangible benefits of the work, improved knowledge capture, in house knowledge etc.

Ultimately it will become a business decision - also from my experience people performing CFD need to be doing it full time to ensure that they can more efficiently use it as a tool, it probably takes at least a year to become proficient for a person with the right skillset.

By: Mel Habte

Mel Habte — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:10:21 +0000

Interesting post. I think everyone there days is “Expert” in “CFD”. I put the cfd in comments because it is people are knowingly or otherwise just throwing it around for problems that are even marginally related. In any case I agree with the post in the broader sense that outsourcing should be done and considered as an alternative…especially for companies that do not require the need to have CFD software on permanent basis and may cut additional costs on software acquisition and license maintennce etc…

But the long run outlook seems still fluid, as to which is better. Years ago, when computng power was a big issue, few companies could afford to run big CFD cases on “super computers”. Now, everyone has “super computer”. It is even threatening the parallel computing world that laptops coming out with multi core processors. If vendors perfect how to make their application run efficiently on these mini - multi processors, I think software costs could be less of an issue and eventually it would come down to other factors in deciding which way to go. But I prefer outsourcing to someone who does it on full time basis and expert in it than some expert engineer in the comppany.

By: Masha Petrova

Masha Petrova — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:56:43 +0000

Dear Kashif and Ajay,

Thank you for the compliments. As long as professionals like you are finding value in what I have to say, I will keep on writing!

Thank you for keeping the posts going.

All the very best,

Masha

By: Masha Petrova

Masha Petrova — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:56:31 +0000

Dear Peter,

Thank you for your comment. Focusing on a certain area of research certainly gives you and edge over companies trying to be all things to all people!
Best,
Masha

By: Kashif Muhammad

Kashif Muhammad — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:54:25 +0000

Fantastic! It is an eyeopener for me. When I read Succeful Unemployment, I was surprised. It seems to me that you are talking to me. I appreciate your writing skills and the way of thinking.

Kashif
Mechanical Design Engineer

By: Peter Graham

Peter Graham — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:52:48 +0000

I agree with your outsourcing comments but outsourcing for people is only as good as their ability to find the necessary outsourcing resources that have a focus on the services that they require. CFD modeling is used for many different industries and purposes. Some companies will offer themselves as experts on everything CFD just to keep busy when they really are a generalist in everything CFD. The company I work for only offers CFD modeling for analyzing people’s Data Centers. We don’t offer this service for any other purpose. Our focus gives us the edge on other companies who play part time in the Data Center space.

By: Ajay Singh Goutam

Ajay Singh Goutam — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 05:52:44 +0000

Hello Masha,

Good post and its really a very practical and fesible to consider outsouceing as an option that keeps you away from so many hassels of Design and engineering which you mention in your post.

Regards
Ajay Singh Goutam
http://www.defiancetechnologies.com

By: Jeff Waters

Jeff Waters — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:21:45 +0000

Masha,
Good post and congrats on teaming up with EURO/CFD. I spent most of my CFD time promoting the use of CFD at the most basic level by non-CFD experts. I would routinely tell managers something like, “look, if you want to simulate incompressible airflow, driven by a fan through a room, there are simple CFD tools that will enable a regular Engineer to be successful. If you want to do multiphase oil droplets flying through the air that might need to ignite… outsourcing would be a better option for the few times THAT is critical.”

So, companies need to use the right tools for the right jobs… and weigh the costs of internal expertise and software against how often that type of analysis will be required.

I think most companies should consider a mix of both when it comes to CAE. And really, is that so uncommon in business? Perhaps you have your own fleet of delivery trucks setup for handling your standard product which comes in a 1′x1′ box. If you get a 1 time mega contract for a product that fits in a 200′x200′ box, would you spend the time investigating the purchase of a gigantic delivery truck? Or would you contact a delivery service specializing in that sort of thing?