Red Cedar Technology
| Company type | Privately held |
|---|---|
| Industry | Design Optimization, CAE Software, and Engineering Services |
| Founded | East Lansing, Michigan, USA (1999) |
| Headquarters | East Lansing, Michigan, USA |
Key people | Bob Ryan, Ph.D. (President) |
| Products | HEEDS MDO HEEDS NP HEEDS POST |
| Services | Engineering Consulting |
| Website | www.redcedartech.com |
Red Cedar Technology is a company specializing in software development and engineering consulting, established in 1999 by professors Ron Averill and Erik Goodman from Michigan State University. Based in East Lansing, Michigan, close to the MSU campus, the firm creates and distributes the HEEDS Professional suite, a multidisciplinary design optimization software derived from technology spun out of MSU. On June 30, 2013, Red Cedar Technology became part of CD-adapco, which was later acquired by Siemens Digital Industries Software in 2016.
History
Red Cedar Technology was founded with the purpose of commercializing technology developed at MSU. Initially, the company provided engineering consulting services such as non-linear finite element analysis (FEA) and design optimization. The HEEDS optimization software product was introduced in 2004.
HEEDS MDO
HEEDS (Hierarchical Evolutionary Engineering Design System) MDO streamlines and improves the process of optimizing product and process designs by connecting with commercial CAE applications. It supports both single-objective and multi-objective (Pareto) optimization approaches, along with Design of Experiments and Reliability analysis capabilities. Previously named HEEDS Professional, the software is utilized across sectors including aerospace, automotive, biomedical engineering, and manufacturing.
Key uses encompass designing Nitinol stents, automotive crash rails, MEMS devices, and composite fiber components. HEEDS interfaces with CAE tools through batch processing or scripting methods and offers direct integration with platforms such as Abaqus, ANSYS, LS-DYNA, Nastran, NX, STAR-CCM+, and Microsoft Excel.
Design Optimization
When confronted with competing performance requirements, engineers frequently turn to design optimization techniques. HEEDS connects seamlessly with common CAE software to investigate various design alternatives based on parameters set by users. It incorporates the SHERPA algorithm—an adaptive, hybrid intelligence method developed over more than two decades at Michigan State University and commercialized by Red Cedar Technology since its inception in 1999.
Additionally, HEEDS includes MO-SHERPA, a multi-objective version of SHERPA that assists users in discovering Pareto optimal solutions and analyzing trade-offs among different goals.
The suite of design optimization algorithms available within HEEDS consists of:
- SHERPA
- Multi-objective SHERPA (MO-SHERPA)
- Genetic algorithm
- Sequential quadratic programming
- Simulated annealing
- Response surface methodology
- Multi-start local search
- Particle swarm optimization
- Nelder-Mead Simplex
Design of Experiments (DOE)
HEEDS facilitates sensitivity analysis through Design of Experiments by employing multiple sampling techniques, including:
- Full and fractional factorial designs with two or three levels
- Taguchi orthogonal arrays and arrays for robust design
- Plackett-Burman configurations
- Latin hypercube approaches
- Central composite and D-optimal experimental designs
- Custom user-defined arrays and associated response datasets
Robustness and Reliability
Within HEEDS, Robustness and Reliability modules support robustness evaluations using Monte Carlo Sampling or Latin hypercube methods. Reliability assessments are conducted through Monte Carlo, Latin hypercube, or the FORM. These procedures evaluate how input uncertainties influence design performance and quantify the likelihood of constraint breaches caused by random variations.
HEEDS NP
HEEDS NP is a mesh-based, non-parametric optimization solution tailored for structural component design. It achieves mass or stress objectives by directly modifying the component’s mesh, thereby simplifying the structural optimization workflow.
HEEDS POST
HEEDS POST serves as a visualization and post-processing platform that works in conjunction with HEEDS MDO output files, enhancing the ability to analyze and interpret design optimization results.
Red Cedar University
Red Cedar University provides specialized training focused on design optimization, aimed at professionals intending to maximize their use of Red Cedar Technology’s software tools.