In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, one thing that’s been heartening to see in the midst of everything that’s going on is the outpouring of efforts to help solve supply shortages from around the world.
Many of these efforts originate from creative makers and passionate hobbyists applying their skills on solving problems in ingenious ways. Some of them are designers or engineers who want to extend their problem-solving expertise to lend a helping hand to ongoing initiatives. Others are manufacturers looking to put their resources to good use.
Some have found their own way to contribute in ways they know how; others may still be searching. Regardless of which group you may fall into, it helps to have a single, coordinated space where you can share, organize, and get feedback on ideas that stand to help with this crisis in ways small and large.
The Open COVID-19 community, set up by the 3DEXPERIENCE Lab team, aims to do just that. The goal of this open global, online community is to help leverage our collective intelligence to source, qualify, design, engineer and manufacture rapid solutions during this pandemic. You can access it free today using your SOLIDWORKS ID or 3DEXPERIENCE ID (which is easy to create), becoming a content author (if desired) by selecting the ‘become an author’ link within the community.
If you’re reading this blog, it’s likely you’re a SOLIDWORKS user. We all know of several online spaces where one could, feasibly, post pictures or screenshots of their ideas, offer assistance, etc. However, one of the things that makes this online community unique is its combination of the following:
Services available:
- Blog posting, commenting and sharing
- Idea funneling to qualify the projects
- Wiki and Q&A community services
- 3D model storage, viewing and sharing
- Millions of standard components and parts
- Access to manufacturing resources
- Product communities for support in particular for CATIA, SOLIDWORKS xDesign
- Search and tagging
In addition to ‘what’ you can do as part of the Open COVID-19 community, ‘who’ you’re doing it with may be just as (if not more) important. In other online spaces, it can be a bit of an unknown as far as who has access to your content, who’s aware of your posts/ideas, etc.
The Open COVID-19 community is actively composed of engineers, designers, manufacturers, scientists, makers and fabbers. Design projects can be shared as 3D models – not just JPEGs. Concepts are actively read and reviewed by the community, consisting of select industry experts, health care professionals and scientists. After launching just a few weeks ago, the community already includes over 300 members from the USA, UK, India, France and the Netherlands (among other countries).
Overall: the objective of the Open COVID-19 community is to consolidate a worldwide list of projects and connect them to people looking for solutions. We wanted to create a single repository to find quality designs and aid in the fabrication of select projects within the manufacturing marketplace or in local fab labs (via the MIT Fab Foundation network).
Connect today with your peers, industry experts and engineers, as well as designers, makers and students. Share your knowledge and skills in design and fabrication, working hand-in-hand with others to help – in your own way – with this pandemic.
Helpful Links:
Direct Link to the Community | https://go.3ds.com/opencovid19
3DEXPERIENCE Lab Website | https://3dexperiencelab.3ds.com/en/projects/fablab/open-covid-19/
Press Release from Dassault Systemes | https://www.3ds.com/newsroom/press-releases/dassault-systemes-initiatives-its-partners-and-clients-face-covid-19-challenges
Special thanks to Frederic Vacher, Abhishek Bali and the >300 active members of the community who are making posts, adding ideas and giving feedback to designs!
Sean O'Neill
Categories: 3DEXPERIENCE, Cloud Computing, Collaboration, Community, Dassault Systèmes, Design, Product Designers and Mechanical Engineers, SOLIDWORKS