Intergraph wins Navy pact for CAD/CAM/CAE systems

Electronic News, Sept 7, 1992 by Jack Robertson

WASHINGTON -- Intergraph Corp. last week was awarded a potential $422 million U.S. Navy contract for computer-aided design, manufacturing and engineering (CAD/CAM/CAE) systems for the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, one year after winning the $362 million Naval Sea Systems CAD-2 contract.

Last week's CAD-2 award, extending over 12 years, is the largest single federal CAD/CAM/CAE contract. Intergraph won over two other contenders: a team of Centel Federal Systems/Autodesk bidding Sun Microsystems workstations, and Federal Computer Corp. bidding IBM RISC workstations.

The Navy can order up to 4,200 Intergraph Interpro and Interact workstations and up to 1,082 Intergraph servers. These systems use the new Intergraph Clipper C400 microprocessor.

All systems will run on Intergraph's own version of Unix, which meets the federal Posix interface standard, and the firm's CAD/CAM applications software. The Naval Facilities Engineering Command will use the systems for architectural engineering and construction planning, facilities management, and geographical layout and planning at centers worldwide.

Also part of the procurement are the Army Corps of Engineers, Air Force civil engineering branches, Naval Civil Engineering Laboratory, Tri-Service CAD and Geographical Information Systems Center, Air Force Environmental Excellence Center, Coast Guard, Environmental Protection Agency and Department of Energy.

By winning the first two umbrella-contract portions of the Navy CAD-2 program, Intergraph takes a major position in the federal market. The firm headed off efforts by Sun and IBM to get a larger penetration of the federal CAD/CAM/CAE market. IBM earlier this year lost out with its RS/6000 workstations in the large Navy TAC-3 bid, which was awarded to Hughes Aircraft bidding Hewlett-Packard RISC computers.

Still pending is a third CAD-2 bid for systems for the Naval Air Systems Command and aviation rework facilities. Intergraph reportedly is vying against Grumman and EDS, with an award expected early next year. The U.S. Forest Service also is gearing up for a large CAD/CAE bid.

Robert Glasier, Intergraph vice president of marketing, said the latest Navy CAD-2 award continues the market trend to a single integrator providing a range of various CAD/CAM/CAE applications using commercial off-the-shelf hardware, with maintenance and software support. He believe firms specializing in one CAD/CAM/CAE area only would have to expand or join together to be competitive in future bids.

He also hoped the omnibus Navy CAD-2 requirements contracts would offer an alternative to some existing military sole-source CAD/CAM/CAE standards, but did not elaborate. Industry sources have been especially critical of a sole-source edict by the Joint Integrated Avionics Working Group (JIAWG) designating DEC's VAX computers for F-22 design work by the aircraft primes and major subcontractors.