Streamlined 3D data delivery cuts costs, saves time

With plants and distribution centres in Auckland
and Sydney and the capacity to produce over
700,000 pieces of furniture per year, Criterion
Group Ltd is the largest manufacturer of ready-toassemble
furniture in Australasia. An innovative
design team, state-of-the-art technology and over
40 years’ experience in the furniture industry
enable the company to produce cutting-edge
designs that are excellent value, functional, easy to
assemble and look great. With design playing such
a crucial role in the company’s business, fi nding
ways to streamline the sharing and processing
of 3D designs across varied operations is critical.
Autodesk worked with Criterion to implement
a new Autodesk Inventor Series platform that
allowed the furniture expert to do just this,
producing savings in time and cost.
Constant upgrades keep Criterion at the cutting
edge
Criterion’s aim is to design and produce furniture
that makes homes and offi ces more attractive and
functional. The company’s success is based on a
design philosophy that adapts the latest trends in
furniture style and functionality to meet specifi c
customer needs. With its strong emphasis on
design, it is key for the company to continually
invest in the latest technologies and most
sophisticated equipment.

Integration of 3D design data was a no-go

A recent improvement that the company wanted
to make was to integrate its 3D design data with
the various types of machinery and CAM packages
it uses. However, many woodworking machines
and their related CAM solutions do not allow the
direct import of 3D data. Criterion was therefore
forced to manually create a special data fi le for
each machine or system, a process that takes
around 30 minutes.
In addition, Criterion had recently purchased an
advanced, high-productivity drilling line, which
required that design data be imported in a very
unique way. Furthermore, production machinery
was becoming increasingly computer-controlled.
Criterion recognised that if the import of 3D data
to machinery and systems could be streamlined, it
would save both time and costs.
New Inventor platform supports 3D data batch
processing
Criterion’s relationship with Autodesk dates back
to the early 1980s — the company was one of the
very fi rst users of AutoCAD in New Zealand. Not
surprisingly then, Criterion approached its longtime
partner Autodesk with its problem, and after
discussion with the reseller — CADPro Systems Ltd
— a brief was developed.
Criterion wanted to leverage the highly intelligent
3D design data from Autodesk Inventor Series and
feed that information directly into the controller
for the new drilling line. Autodesk’s Professional
Services (APS) Team worked together with
Criterion’s engineers to scope out the desired
solution. APS delivered customised code to extend
the capabilities of Inventor and allow a simple
interface to export the data directly into the new
drilling line in the correct fashion.
This new integrated engineering process means
that a task that once took 30 minutes to complete
now takes less than fi ve minutes.