Delcam’s Sales Partner Meeting in Birmingham attracts record attendance

Delcam’s 2010 Sales Partner Meeting, which was held in Birmingham last week, attracted over 200 delegates, the highest attendance in the company’s history. This record number of delegates reflected Delcam’s growth over recent years. As well as being firmly established as the world’s largest specialist supplier of CAM software and services, Delcam is expanding into many new industries, especially in the healthcare sector.

The main highlights of the meeting were the 2010 versions of Delcam’s software and the range of new releases planned by the company over the coming year. This constant stream of innovation shows that Delcam has not only the largest development team in the CAM industry but also one of the most productive. Unlike many of its competitors, which have cut their expenditure on development during the current downturn, Delcam has maintained its high levels of investment in R&D.

While the enhancements to its core CADCAM range were acclaimed by the delegates, strong interest was also shown in the Healthcare Division established by Delcam during last year. This new Division is helping companies across the medical, dental and associated industries to apply Delcam’s expertise and experience in taking advantage of the latest design and manufacturing techniques.

With the healthcare sector being one area that seems immune from the economic slowdown, Delcam sees it as a major opportunity for growth. The company’s design, reverse engineering, machining and inspection software are already used in a wide range of applications from the production of prostheses, through to the manufacture of surgical instruments and all types of medical packaging. This is especially true for the PartMaker machining system for turn-mill equipment and Swiss-type lathes. These machines are used extensively for the manufacture of medical and dental components, to the extent that around 70% of PartMaker sales already come from the healthcare industry.

In addition, Delcam is seeing growing interest in the various specific products for the healthcare market that it has introduced over the last two years. These include the DentCAD and DentMILL programs for the design and manufacture of dental restorations and the OrthoModel and OrthoMill software for the development of orthotics. The company also offers special versions of its CRISPIN range of footwear design and manufacturing software for the production of orthopaedic footwear.

The common theme with all these products is that they take existing Delcam technology and add a dedicated interface that uses imagery and terminology from the healthcare sector. This makes the software easy to learn and quick to use for healthcare professionals, even those that are not familiar with using computer-based design and manufacturing.