Onshape is a

computer-aided design Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve c ...

(CAD)

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists o ...

system, delivered over the Internet via a

software as a service Software as a service (SaaS ) is a software licensing and delivery model in which software is licensed on a subscription basis and is centrally hosted. SaaS is also known as "on-demand software" and Web-based/Web-hosted software. SaaS is cons ...

(SAAS) model. It makes extensive use of cloud computing, with compute-intensive processing and rendering performed on

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

-based servers, and users are able to interact with the system via a

web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...

or the

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

and Android apps. As a SAAS system, Onshape upgrades are released directly to the web interface, and the software does not require maintenance work from the user. Onshape allows teams to collaborate on a single shared design, the same way multiple writers can work together editing a shared document via cloud services. It is primarily focused on mechanical CAD (MCAD) and is used for product and machinery design across many industries, including

consumer electronics Consumer electronics or home electronics are electronic ( analog or digital) equipment intended for everyday use, typically in private homes. Consumer electronics include devices used for entertainment, communications and recreation. Usually ...

, mechanical

machinery A machine is a physical system using power to apply forces and control movement to perform an action. The term is commonly applied to artificial devices, such as those employing engines or motors, but also to natural biological macromolecules ...

medical devices A medical device is any device intended to be used for medical purposes. Significant potential for hazards are inherent when using a device for medical purposes and thus medical devices must be proved safe and effective with reasonable assura ...

3D printing 3D printing or additive manufacturing is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model. It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer ...

, machine parts, and industrial equipment.

Company history

Onshape was developed by a company with the same name. Founded in 2012, Onshape was based in

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. As part of the Boston metropolitan area, the cities population of the 2020 U.S. census was 118,403, making it the fourth most populous city in the state, behind Boston, ...

(USA), with offices in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borderin ...

and

Pune, India Pune (; ; also known as Poona, ( the official name from 1818 until 1978) is one of the most important industrial and educational hubs of India, with an estimated population of 7.4 million As of 2021, Pune Metropolitan Region is the largest i ...

. Its leadership team includes several engineers and executives who originated

SolidWorks SolidWorks is a solid modeling computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided engineering (CAE) application published by Dassault Systèmes. According to the publisher, over two million engineers and designers at more than 165,000 companies wer ...

, a popular 3D CAD program that runs on

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

. Onshape’s co-founders include two former SolidWorks CEOs,

Jon Hirschtick Jon Hirschtick is a CAD software developer, founder and former CEO of SolidWorks, a popular solid modeling 3D CAD and CAE system for Microsoft Windows, and Onshape, a cloud platform for product development that includes tools for CAD, data manag ...

and John McEleney. * In November 2012, former SolidWorks CEOs Jon Hirschtick and John McEleney led six co-founders launching Belmont Technology, a placeholder name that was later changed to Onshape. The company’s first round of funding was $9 million from North Bridge Venture Partners and Commonwealth Capital. * In March 2015, Onshape released the public beta version of its cloud CAD software, after pre-production testing with more than a thousand CAD professionals in 52 countries. Included in the beta launch was Onshape for iPhone. * In August 2015, the company released its Onshape for Android app. * In December 2015, Onshape launched its full commercial release. The company also launched the Onshape App Store, offering CAM, simulation, rendering and other cloud-based engineering tools. The Onshape App Store was launched with 24 developer partners. * In April 2016, Onshape introduced its Education Plan, with a free version of Onshape Professional geared for college students and educators. * In May 2016, Onshape released FeatureScript, a new open source (MIT licensed) programming language for creating and customizing CAD features. In October 2019, Onshape agreed to be acquired by PTC. The acquisition closed in November 2019 for $470 million.

Funding

Onshape was a venture-backed company with investments from firms including

Andreessen Horowitz Andreessen Horowitz (also called a16z, legal name AH Capital Management, LLC) is a private American venture capital firm, founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. The company is headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Andreessen ...

, Commonwealth Capital Ventures,

New Enterprise Associates New Enterprise Associates (NEA) is an American-based venture capital firm. NEA focuses investment stages ranging from seed stage through growth stage across an array of industry sectors. With ~$25 billion in committed capital, NEA is one of the w ...

(NEA) and North Bridge Venture Partners. Total venture funding amounted to $169 million.>

Supported file formats

Modelling

Importing

As of April 2022, the Onshape supported importing (opening) the following common CAD file formats: * STEP (

ISO 10303 ISO 10303 is an ISO standard for the computer-interpretable representation and exchange of product manufacturing information. It is an ASCII-based format. Its official title is: ''Automation systems and integration — Product data representa ...

) * ISO JT (ISO 14306) *

Parasolid Parasolid is a geometric modeling kernel originally developed by Shape Data Limited, now owned and developed by Siemens Digital Industries Software. It can be licensed by other companies for use in their 3D computer graphics software products. ...

XT * ACIS *

IGES The Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES) is a vendor-neutral file format that allows the digital exchange of information among computer-aided design (CAD) systems. It's an ASCII-based textual format. The official title of IGES is ''Dig ...

CATIA CATIA (, an acronym of computer-aided three-dimensional interactive application) is a multi-platform software suite for computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), computer-aided engineering (CAE), 3D modeling and Product l ...

v4, v5, v6 *

Autodesk Inventor Autodesk Inventor is a computer-aided design application for 3D mechanical design, simulation, visualization, and documentation developed by Autodesk. Features Inventor allows 2D and 3D data integration in a single environment, creating a virt ...

** Part (.IPT) ** Assembly (.IAM) ** Presentation (.IPN) ** Drawing (.IDW, . DXF/.DWG) * Pro/ENGINEER, Creo *

Rhinoceros 3D Rhinoceros (typically abbreviated Rhino or Rhino3D) is a commercial 3D computer graphics and computer-aided design (CAD) application software that was developed by Robert McNeel & Associates, an American, privately held, and employee-owned com ...

: .3dm * .STL * .OBJ *

file formats *

Siemens NX NX, formerly known as "unigraphics", is an advanced high-end CAD/ CAM/ CAE, which has been owned since 2007 by Siemens Digital Industries Software. In 2000, Unigraphics purchased SDRC I-DEAS and began an effort to integrate aspects of both softwa ...

file formats

Exporting

Onshape supports exporting to the following formats: * STEP (

) *

XT * ACIS *

file formats * .STL *

: .3dm *

Collada COLLADA (for ''COLLA''borative ''D''esign ''A''ctivity) is an interchange file format for interactive 3D applications. It is managed by the nonprofit technology consortium, the Khronos Group, and has been adopted by ISO as a publicly available s ...

XML-spec based textual file

Drawing

Ordinary

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...

technical drawing Technical drawing, drafting or drawing, is the act and discipline of composing drawings that visually communicate how something functions or is constructed. Technical drawing is essential for communicating ideas in industry and engineering. T ...

can be exported as .

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems ...

file.

Assembly

Assemblies can be imported and exported to: * STEP (

) *

XT * ACIS * Pro/ENGINEER, Creo * ISO JT *