We supply engineering design software in South Africa. We are the authorised SOLIDWORKS reseller for this region.

We do three things. We sell SOLIDWORKS Design and the rest of the Dassault Systèmes range. We train the people who use it. And we support it once it is running.

Our engineers work from Centurion, Cape Town and Durban. So when something goes wrong, you speak to someone nearby. You are not logging a ticket with a helpdesk on another continent.

Since 1996. That is when we became the official SOLIDWORKS reseller for Sub-Saharan Africa.

The business started earlier. Ben Terreblanche founded MEGKON in 1986, working in mechanical engineering. A year later it became the first Mastercam reseller in South Africa. MECAD Systems was formed in 1993, after MEGKON Incorporated and MEGKON Systems split.

So there are four decades of engineering software behind us. Three of them are with SOLIDWORKS.

That matters for one reason. Our engineers have worked through every version change and every migration since 1996. Some of our customers have been with us since the 1990s.

Our About page has the full timeline.

Yes. Here is what that changes for you.

• Your licences are genuine. They are registered to your company, so activation, transfers and renewals work when you need them.
• You get the subscription services. That means version updates and access to the official Dassault Systèmes knowledge base.
• Support comes from local engineers. With SOLIDWORKS, the partner is the support route. It is not an extra you buy on top.

It also matters when something goes wrong. Licences bought elsewhere can be hard to support, transfer or renew. We go into this in why you should buy SOLIDWORKS from a reseller. People usually find that out at the worst moment.

More than 2 700 active clients across Africa.

The number is not really the point. What matters is that we have probably already done what you are trying to do. We can tell you what worked and what did not.

It also means our customer stories are local. A South African manufacturer learns more from a company down the road than from one overseas with different suppliers and lead times.

Four, and each covers a different part of the work.

• MECAD Manufacturing, 2012. Manufacturing software, including nesting. SigmaNEST sits here.
• MECAD Technologies, 2021. FEA and CFD consulting, plus programming work. This is where implementation and engineering services live.
• MC Technology Staffing, 2022. Recruitment for design, engineering and manufacturing roles.
• MECAD Academy, 2023. Training, including the SOLIDWORKS courses.

Why split them up? Selling software, setting it up and solving engineering problems are different jobs. Each company does one of them full time.

Not sure who you need? Ask us. One conversation costs less than buying the wrong thing.

We sell SOLIDWORKS and the wider Dassault Systèmes range. That covers more than the design packages. It includes simulation, flow and plastics analysis, PDM and Manage for data, CAM, Electrical, Inspection, MBD, Visualize, Composer, and DraftSight for 2D.

Anything outside that range sits with another company in the group. The question above lists them.

Not sure what fits your work? Describe the problem rather than the product. We will point you to the right team, even when that team is not ours.

Yes. Our customer stories cover local manufacturers and engineering firms. They range from machine building and fabrication to security products and motorsport.

Each story covers the same three things. What the business designs. What problem brought them to SOLIDWORKS. What changed afterwards.

They are specific on purpose. A vague testimonial tells you nothing about whether the software suits your work.

Would you rather speak to a customer than read about one? Say so and we will try to introduce you.

SOLIDWORKS is parametric 3D design software for engineers and product designers. You build a model where dimensions drive the geometry, so changing a dimension updates the part, the assembly it sits in and every drawing made from it.

A typical workflow runs through three stages:

• Modelling. Parts are built from sketches and features, then brought together into assemblies where mates define how components fit and move. Parametric modelling, sheet metal design and weldments are in every package, with mould and surfacing tools alongside them.
• Documentation. 2D drawings are generated from the 3D model and stay linked to it, so a change upstream flows into the drawing rather than being redrawn.
• Validation and output. Depending on the package you can test the design under load, render it, check it against manufacturing rules and produce the data your supplier or machine needs.

Our guide to what SOLIDWORKS is used for goes further. It is used across machine building, sheet metal fabrication, consumer products, mould and tool design, mining equipment and industrial machinery. The common thread is work that ends in something manufactured, where a drawing on its own is not enough.

Each package contains everything in the one below it, so the question is only how far up you need to go.

• Standard is the entry-level package. It covers parametric modelling, sheet metal design and weldments, along with mould tools, 2D drawings, design and manufacturability checks, ECAD-MCAD collaboration, and secure cloud file and revision management.
• Professional adds PDM Standard for file management, cost estimating, advanced photorealistic rendering and ECAD/MCAD collaboration. In practice this is the package for teams who need a component library, need to quote from the model, or need presentation-quality images.
• Premium adds motion analysis, linear stress analysis, piping and electrical routing, and environmental impact assessment. This is where validation moves in-house rather than being outsourced or left to physical prototypes.
• Ultimateincludes SOLIDWORKS Design Premium and extends it onto the 3DEXPERIENCE platform with cloud design, wider simulation, lifecycle management, marketing content and manufacturing tools.

One point that catches people out: SOLIDWORKS Simulation is sold as its own product with its own Standard, Professional and Premium packages. The analysis included in Design Premium is not the same thing as SOLIDWORKS Simulation Premium.

Our edition comparison article goes through the differences in more detail.

Ultimate is the most complete package in the SOLIDWORKS Design line-up. It includes SOLIDWORKS Design Premium and extends it onto the 3DEXPERIENCE platform across four areas:

• Design and simulate.Freeform and subdivision design tools, a fastener and hardware library with an online catalogue of over 50 million components, specialised tools for routing, large assemblies, weldments, mould design and sheet metal, and simulation covering linear stress, frequency and modal, thermal, linear buckling and motion analysis, with cloud computing for the simulation itself.
• Collaborate and manage.Cross-discipline collaboration, sharing and markup for outside stakeholders, secure CAD-aware cloud storage, branching and merging for revisions, cloud BOM and lifecycle management, project tasks linked to design data, Gantt charts and whiteboarding.
• Document and market.Cloud-based technical illustrations, user guides, photorealistic renderings and immersive 3D experiences from VR to web.
• Manufacture.Rule-based machining, automated feature and hole recognition, real-time toolpath verification, nesting, a manufacturability checker, and wire EDM, laser, waterjet and plasma cutting.

It suits teams already at the limits of Premium, particularly where data management, project management and manufacturing output are currently handled in separate systems. If you are only pushing against one of those limits, buying the individual product is usually the better value, and we will tell you which way the numbers fall for your situation.

Cloud Services is not a separate add-on you buy. The cloud capability sits inside the Standard package, and because Professional and Premium each contain everything in Standard, it runs across all three.

In the Standard package that covers secure cloud file and revision management, real-time markup and sharing, ECAD-MCAD collaboration, manufacturing documentation, additive manufacturing and NC programming, and design and manufacturability checks. Dassault Systèmes also publishes service commitments alongside it: a 99.5% uptime SLA, daily backups retained for seven days, ISO 9001:2015 certification and OWASP Top 10 compliance.

Two practical points. The cloud features are described as available to enable when you are ready rather than switched on by default, so they may need activating. And cloud file management is not the same as SOLIDWORKS PDM. If you need check-in and check-out, enforced workflows and revision control across a team, that is PDM, which is a separate product.

It depends less on what you design than on what happens to the design afterwards. A rough guide:

• Standard if your work is modelling parts and assemblies and issuing drawings, and validation happens through prototypes or a third party.
• Professional if you need a managed component library, quote from your models, produce rendered images for customers or proposals, or want PDM Standard to stop files living on individual machines.
• Premium if you route piping or electrical harnesses, need motion and linear stress analysis in-house, or work with complex surfacing.
• Ultimate if several of the above are true at once and you are also managing projects and manufacturing data in separate systems.

The common mistake is buying up a tier for one feature. If you need only simulation, or only data management, the standalone product is usually cheaper than the package above you. The opposite mistake is buying Standard for a team that will clearly need routing within the year, then paying to upgrade seats separately.

Describe what you build, how many people design, and what currently slows the work down. We will recommend accordingly, which is not always the biggest package.

Our guide to choosing the right SOLIDWORKS licence covers this in full. SOLIDWORKS Design is available to purchase in quarterly and yearly term licences. Within that, the choice is between two licence types:

• Named-user.A cloud-based licence accessible on multiple devices, tied to the person rather than the machine. This suits designers who move between a workstation and a laptop, or who work from more than one site.
• Device.Tied to a single machine. This suits fixed workstations, and shared machines where whoever sits down needs access.

Dassault Systèmes also applies a 15-day money-back policy on yearly and quarterly subscriptions, which excludes trial offers.

Perpetual licences are available from us on request. They are not sold through the shop, so ask for a quote if you would rather own the licence outright than run it on a term.

Which works out better depends on how many people design, how often, and whether they are at fixed workstations. Talk to us before you decide, because the wrong licence type is more expensive to unpick later than to get right at the start.

It depends on your licence type. A named-user licence gives you the flexibility to install SOLIDWORKS Design on multiple devices, because the licence follows the person. A device licence is tied to a single machine and does not.

The practical case is a designer with a desktop at the office and a laptop for site visits. On a named-user licence that works as you would expect. On a device licence it does not, and the second machine needs its own.

If you are not sure which type you hold, ask us before installing anywhere new. We can check what is registered against your account, which is quicker than finding out when an activation fails.

SOLIDWORKS runs on 64-bit Windows only, and the specification that matters most is memory, followed by the graphics card.

• Operating system.Windows 11 and Windows 10, both 64-bit. Windows Home editions and Windows To Go are not supported.
• Memory.16 GB, with 32 GB recommended. For PDM Contributor and Viewer or Electrical Schematic on their own, 8 GB with 16 GB recommended. Large assemblies are where the 32 GB earns itself back.
• Processor.x86_64, meaning Intel 64 or AMD64. Dassault Systèmes does not publish a minimum clock speed or core count.
• Graphics. A certified card and driver is the requirement people most often miss. Consumer gaming cards frequently sit outside the certified list, and the symptom is graphical glitches rather than an outright failure, so it gets misdiagnosed. Check your card against the certification list before buying.
• Storage.SSDs are recommended for optimal performance. No minimum disk space figure is published.
• Microsoft Office.Office 2021 and 2024 are supported for SOLIDWORKS 2025 and 2026, with 64-bit recommended. This matters for BOM export and anything that writes to Excel.

On Mac hardware, only eDrawings for Mac is available. SOLIDWORKS itself is not supported through Boot Camp.

Virtualised environments are supported on VMware vSphere ESXi, VMware Workstation, Microsoft Hyper-V and Parallels Desktop for Mac, and a GPU is still required for sensible performance. SOLIDWORKS Composer is not supported in virtualised environments at all.

Two things worth doing that are not strictly requirements. Dassault Systèmes suggests exempting SOLIDWORKS file types and folders from your antivirus, which noticeably improves file open and save times and PDM performance. And note that VPN solutions are not tested or certified, so remote access over VPN is supported on a best-effort basis only.

Two articles go deeper: what your team actually needs, and what computer you need to run SOLIDWORKS.

Send us your workstation specification and we will tell you whether it will cope before you spend anything.

The difference is parametric 3D modelling rather than 2D drafting, and it changes how work behaves when something has to change.

In SOLIDWORKS, dimensions drive the geometry. Assemblies hold the relationships between components, so parts move and fit as they would in reality, and interferences show up on screen instead of on the shop floor. Drawings are generated from the model and stay linked to it, so a dimension change flows through to every drawing that references it.

In a 2D drafting workflow, each view is drawn and each has to be updated by hand. That is perfectly efficient for work that ends in a drawing. It gets expensive when the same design has to be revised repeatedly, manufactured, simulated or quoted from.

The practical test is what your work produces. If the deliverable is documentation, 2D tools do the job. If it is a manufactured part, especially one that goes through revisions, the time 3D saves on changes usually outweighs the time it costs to learn.

We compare the two directly in is SOLIDWORKS better than AutoCAD?

Many engineers use both, and they are not mutually exclusive. SOLIDWORKS opens and exports DWG and DXF, so existing 2D libraries are not stranded. We also supply DraftSight for teams who need a dedicated 2D tool alongside it.

Our article on what SOLIDWORKS costs in South Africa breaks it down. Current prices in rand are published on our SOLIDWORKS shop, where you can see what each package costs on a 3-month or 1-year term and buy directly.

What drives the number is which package you need, the term you take, how many seats you are licensing, and whether those are named-user or device licences. Our full breakdown is in how much SOLIDWORKS costs in South Africa.

Two things worth knowing before you compare quotes. The package matters more than the seat count for most small teams, because moving from Standard to Premium costs more than adding a second Standard seat. And buying up a tier for a single feature is usually worse value than buying the standalone product, which is why we ask what you design before quoting.

For pricing matched to your setup, request a quote and tell us what you design and how many people need access. We will quote for what the work needs.

Three things: the software, the subscription services that come with it, and local support.

• The software for the package you choose, including the cloud capability that sits in every SOLIDWORKS Design package.
• Subscription services, giving you version updates as they release and access to the official Dassault Systèmes knowledge base.
• Technical support from our engineers, covering the software and the problems that come with it in practice.

Some bundles on our shop also include the MECAD Essential Enhanced Subscription, which extends what you get beyond the standard subscription services.

What is not automatically included is implementation. Installation and licence setup we handle. Migrating data from another system, rebuilding templates and drawing standards, or reworking how your team manages files is project work, and sits with MECAD Technologies. We will tell you upfront if your situation needs it rather than letting you discover it afterwards.

Through us. We have been the authorised SOLIDWORKS reseller for Sub-Saharan Africa since 1996, so licences for this region are issued through an authorised partner rather than bought directly.

Worth reading first: what to know before you buy.

There are two routes. If you already know which package you need, you can buy online through our SOLIDWORKS shop, with prices in rand and direct checkout. Licence keys are issued within 5 working days of payment clearing.

If you are not certain which package fits, or you need several seats, a perpetual licence or anything non-standard, it is worth going through a quote instead. How that runs:

• Tell us what you design and how many people need access. This is what determines the package, and getting it right here is cheaper than correcting it later.
• We quote for the package and licence type that fits, covering the term options.
• If you are new to SOLIDWORKS, we will usually suggest the 90-Day Pilot Project first, so you are buying on evidence rather than on a demo.
• Once agreed, we issue and register the licences, help with installation and activation, and set up training if you need it.

Request a quote or contact the office nearest you in Centurion, Cape Town or Durban.

Yes. Our SOLIDWORKS shop lists packages with prices in rand and direct checkout, so you can buy without waiting for a quote.

What is on it: SOLIDWORKS Standard, Professional and Premium with Cloud Services, on 3-month or 1-year terms, and bundles that include our MECAD Essential Enhanced Subscription. Prices shown exclude VAT.

After payment clears, licence keys are issued within 5 working days. You will need internet access for the initial activation.

Buying online suits you if you already know which package you need. If you are weighing up packages, licensing several seats, want a perpetual licence or are new to SOLIDWORKS, ask for a quote instead and we will work out what fits before you spend anything.

Send us a request through the quote form or call the office nearest you.

You will get a faster and more accurate quote if you can tell us:

• What you design — sheet metal, machinery, moulded parts, piped systems. This decides the package more than anything else.
• How many people need a seat, and whether they all design full time or some only need to view and mark up.
• Whether anyone has used SOLIDWORKS before, which tells us whether training should be quoted alongside.
• What you use now, since migrating existing data sometimes needs scoping separately.

You do not need to know which package you want. Working that out is our job.

Yes. We run a 90-Day Pilot Project for first-time users: 90 days of full access to SOLIDWORKS Design, with guided training and support from our engineers throughout.

Dassault Systèmes also offers a short self-service trial directly, and there is a 15-day money-back policy on quarterly and yearly subscriptions that excludes trial offers.

The difference is what you learn. A short unsupported trial tells you whether the interface feels workable. Ninety days with training tells you whether SOLIDWORKS handles your actual parts, your assembly sizes and your drawing standards, which is the question that matters. Most evaluations fail not because the software cannot do the job but because nobody had time to learn it well enough to find out.

If you have used SOLIDWORKS before and only need to check a specific capability, say so. A short trial or a focused demonstration may be the better use of your time.

It is a structured evaluation for businesses new to SOLIDWORKS, open to first-time users. You get 90 days of full access to SOLIDWORKS Design, with guided training and support from our certified engineers.

The point of the length is that it covers a real project rather than a demonstration. Ninety days is enough to model something you actually need, issue the drawings, make the changes a real job demands, and find out where the friction is. A two-hour demo cannot tell you that.

By the end you have two answers rather than one: whether SOLIDWORKS fits your process, and whether your team can use it. If the answer to either is no, you have found out before spending on licences. If it is yes, your team is already productive on day one rather than starting from scratch.

Details and how to apply are on the 90-Day Pilot Project page.

Yes, and most teams do. Starting with a small number of seats and adding as the workload grows is the normal pattern, as is moving up a package once simulation, routing or rendering becomes part of the work.

Two things worth getting right. New seats should sit on the same renewal cycle as your existing ones where possible, or you end up managing several renewal dates for no benefit. And if you are adding a capability rather than a user, check whether the standalone product is better value than moving everyone up a package. For a single person who needs analysis, SOLIDWORKS Simulation is usually cheaper than putting the whole team on Premium.

Upgrades from Standard to Professional or Premium are handled by contacting us rather than through the shop, because the existing licence has to be taken into account.

Check with us before buying additional licences. We can see what is registered against your account, so the new seats fit alongside it rather than becoming a second, separate arrangement.

Yes. We run SOLIDWORKS training through MECAD Academy, covering everything from a first introduction to the software through to specialised modules for teams already working in it.

If you are weighing it up, see why you need SOLIDWORKS training and how training pays off.

Training follows the official SOLIDWORKS curriculum, which runs from SOLIDWORKS Design Essentials at four days through specialised courses in drawings, assemblies, surfacing, sheet metal, weldments and mould design, and on into Simulation, PDM, Electrical and CAM.

Most teams start with Essentials and add specialised courses as the work demands them, rather than booking everything upfront. A fabricator needs Sheet Metal and Weldments early; a consultancy producing drawing packs needs the Drawings course first. We will tell you the order that fits your work.

Scheduling matters as much as content. Courses can be run around project deadlines rather than pulling a whole department out in one week, which is usually what makes the difference between training that sticks and training that gets cancelled.

Our courses follow the official SOLIDWORKS curriculum. The main ones, with their standard durations:

• Getting started — SOLIDWORKS Design Essentials, 4 days. The starting point for almost everyone. A Refresher course of 4 days covers returning users.
• Core skills — Drawings and Assembly Modeling at 3 days each, Advanced Part Modeling at 3 days, and Advanced Topics at 5 days.
• Specialised design — Surface Modeling, Mold Design and Sheet Metal at 2 days each, Weldments at 1.5 days, plus Routing for electrical and for piping and tubing at 2 days each.
• Simulation — SOLIDWORKS Simulation at 3 days, Simulation Professional at 1 day, Simulation Premium Nonlinear and Dynamics at 2 days each, Motion and Flow Simulation at 2 days each, and Plastics at 3 days.
• Data management — Using SOLIDWORKS PDM at 1 day, Administering SOLIDWORKS PDM at 2 days.
• Electrical — Schematic at 3 days, 3D at 1 day, Advanced at 1.5 days.
• Other — CAM Standard at 2.5 days, CAM Professional at 2 days, Visualize at 2 days, Composer at 3 days, MBD at 1 day, Inspection at half a day, API Fundamentals at 3 days and DraftSight Essentials at 2 days.

Durations are the standard course lengths. Get in touch for current scheduling and availability at the office nearest you, and we will tell you which courses make sense in which order for the work your team does.

We answer this in detail in how long it takes to learn SOLIDWORKS. The short version: long enough to be worth planning for, and shorter than most people fear. A realistic progression:

• Days one to four.SOLIDWORKS Design Essentials runs four days and covers sketching, part modelling, assemblies and drawings. You leave able to build a part and document it.
• The first few weeks. Most new users become productive on their own work within a few weeks of the course, provided they are modelling regularly. Without regular use it fades quickly, which is the single biggest predictor of whether training pays off.
• Six months or so. This is the point Dassault Systèmes uses as a benchmark for the CSWP, which is aimed at people using the software full time for six months or more.
• Longer. Using it well, meaning stable assemblies, drawings that update cleanly, and parts built so they can be changed later without breaking, comes from project work rather than more courses.

The distinction that matters is between operating the software and modelling well. The first is a few weeks. The second is a habit built over projects, and it is where the real time savings live, because a badly built model costs you every time it has to change.

If you are coming from 2D drafting, expect the first week to feel slower than your current workflow. That is normal and it reverses.

Both are available, and they solve different problems.

Instructor-led training works best for fundamentals. Someone can answer the question you did not know how to ask, correct a modelling habit before it sets, and keep a group moving at the same pace. The trade-off is that it takes people out of production for whole days.

Self-paced online training through SolidProfessor suits teams who cannot release people for a full week, who are spread across sites, or who need a specific answer months after the course has finished. Short video lessons can be revisited whenever a task calls for them.

Most teams that get good results use both: instructor-led for the foundation, self-paced for ongoing development and for new starters who join between scheduled courses. On-site training is also an option where it makes sense to teach on your own parts rather than course exercises.

Tell us how many people need training, where they are and how much time you can realistically release, and we will suggest a mix that fits.

SolidProfessor is a self-paced online training library for SOLIDWORKS. Users work through short video lessons at their own pace, and can return to a specific lesson whenever a task calls for it rather than sitting a whole course again.

It fits three situations well. Teams who cannot release people for a full course week. New starters who join between scheduled courses and would otherwise wait months. And experienced users who need one specific technique, where a two-day course is far more than the question warrants.

What it does not replace is the foundation. Self-paced learning rewards people who already know roughly what they are looking for, so it works best after instructor-led training rather than instead of it, particularly for someone who has never modelled before.

Our SolidProfessor page covers what is included and how licences work.

Our complete guide to SOLIDWORKS certification covers all of this. They are the official certifications, set by Dassault Systèmes and earned by passing practical exams. There are three levels, each building on the one below.

• CSWA, Certified SOLIDWORKS Associate.The entry level, for users new to the software who have completed a beginner course.
• CSWP, Certified SOLIDWORKS Professional.For users who have mastered the fundamentals and use the software full time, at least 40 hours a week, for six months or more.
• CSWE, Certified SOLIDWORKS Expert.For highly experienced users pursuing leadership or specialised, high-responsibility roles.

The CSWE is a serious commitment and worth understanding before anyone sets out for it. You must pass the CSWP first, then at least four of the five CSWP advanced topic exams covering Sheet Metal, Weldments, Surfacing, Mold Tools and Drawing Tools. The exam itself runs four hours, requires 80% to pass, and there is a 90-day wait between attempts with a new exam credit needed each time.

Beyond the three core levels there are over 30 exams applying those level names to specific areas, such as Simulation Expert or Sheet Metal Professional, plus Associate and Professional certifications for DraftSight and 3DEXPERIENCE products.

Why they are worth having: for individuals, a credential an employer can verify rather than take on trust. For employers, a way of confirming that a designer can do the work before you depend on it, and a reasonable benchmark to set for a team.

Your subscription includes technical support from our engineers, software updates for each new release, and access to the official Dassault Systèmes knowledge base.

What support actually covers, in practice:

• Installation, activation and licensing — including the problems that surface later, such as a licence not releasing or an activation failing after a hardware change.
• Performance — large assemblies slowing down, rebuilds taking too long, drawings that take minutes to open. Often a modelling or settings issue rather than a hardware one.
• File and data problems — broken references, missing components, files that will not open, imported geometry that behaves badly.
• How-to questions — how to achieve a specific result, which tool fits a particular job.

What sits outside support is project work: migrating data from another system, rebuilding templates and standards, or redesigning how your team manages files. That is MECAD Technologies, and it is scoped separately because it is engineering consulting rather than a software fault.

The practical value of local support is that the engineer answering has worked with South African manufacturers for years. You are not explaining your context from scratch to someone in another time zone.

Yes. Installation, licence activation and initial configuration are part of what you get when you buy through us. Our guide to downloading and installing SOLIDWORKS covers the steps.

Worth doing properly at the start, because the things that get skipped tend to resurface as problems months later. Templates and drawing standards set up once save every drawing afterwards. Correct licence registration avoids activation failures when a machine is replaced. File locations agreed upfront avoid the situation where half the team keeps work on their desktop.

Before installing, check your hardware against the published system requirements, particularly memory and whether your graphics card is on the certified list. Send us the specification and we will confirm it before you install rather than after.

If the setup involves migrating existing data or rebuilding a template library, that is larger than installation and we will say so upfront.

Yes. It is worth understanding what the job involves, because migration is usually underestimated.

Opening old files is the easy part, and SOLIDWORKS supports most formats. SOLIDWORKS imports the common formats, and DWG and DXF come across without difficulty. The work sits in everything around the geometry:

• Part and assembly structure — imported geometry often arrives without the feature history that makes a model editable, so parts that will be revised may need rebuilding rather than importing.
• Drawing standards and templates — title blocks, sheet formats, dimension styles and your company standards have to be recreated, not converted.
• Libraries — standard parts, fasteners and commonly used components need setting up so people do not model them again.
• File management — where files live and how revisions are handled, which is usually the moment PDM comes up.

The decision that saves the most time is being honest about what actually needs to come across. Most businesses have far more legacy data than they need in the new system, and migrating all of it costs more than it returns.

This kind of implementation work sits with MECAD Technologies, who scope it against the data you actually have rather than quoting blind.

Yes, through MECAD Technologies, which was established in 2021 for exactly this work.

They cover FEA and CFD consulting, programming consultation, implementation and data management projects. In other words, the engineering work that sits around the software rather than inside it, including the cases where you need the analysis done rather than the tool to do it yourself.

The split is deliberate. MECAD Systems sells and supports the products. MECAD Technologies does the project work. Keeping them separate means neither is a sideline, and it means we can tell you honestly when a consulting engagement would serve you better than a licence.

That happens more often than you might expect. If you need one simulation a year, paying a consultant is cheaper than buying and learning the software. If you need one a month, the licence pays for itself. We will tell you which side of that line you are on.

Several places, depending on what kind of answer you need. Our blog is the main one, with What’s New in SOLIDWORKS 2026 covering the current release.

• Our knowledge base carries help articles and answers to common technical questions, written for this market.
• Our blog covers features, workflows and version changes across the product range.
• Our YouTube channel holds recorded webinars, which suit watching a workflow end to end rather than reading about it.
• The official Dassault Systèmes knowledge base, which your subscription gives you access to.

For a specific problem that is blocking work, contact support rather than searching. That is what the subscription is for, and an engineer who has seen the problem before will resolve it faster than an afternoon of searching will.

For structured learning rather than one-off answers, our training courses and SolidProfessor are the better route. Tutorials are good at answering a question you already know how to ask; training is what tells you which questions to ask.

Three, covering South Africa's main industrial regions:

• Centurion, Gauteng — our head office, in Rosehip Office Park. Serves Gauteng and the inland provinces.
• Cape Town, Western Cape — in Milnerton.
• Durban, KwaZulu-Natal — in Kloof.

Having engineers in all three matters more than it might sound. Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal have quite different industrial profiles, and support from someone who knows your region's manufacturing base is more useful than a generic helpdesk. It also means site visits are practical rather than an expedition.

Full addresses and contact details for each are on our contact page.

Yes. Our offices are where our engineers are based, not the limit of where we work.

We support customers throughout South Africa, including the Eastern Cape, Free State, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, North West and Northern Cape. Most support is remote regardless of where you are, because screen sharing resolves a SOLIDWORKS problem faster than travel does. Site visits happen where the work genuinely needs someone present: implementations, training, and evaluations where seeing how your team works changes the recommendation.

Tell us where you are and we will tell you which office looks after your area and what that means in practice for response times and visits.

Yes. Our territory is Sub-Saharan Africa, not only South Africa, and our clients are spread across it.

What varies by country is the practical side rather than the licensing: currency and invoicing, how support is delivered, whether on-site visits are feasible, and lead times on anything physical. Those are worth settling upfront rather than discovering later.

Get in touch with your location and what you need, and we will confirm exactly what we can offer in your country before you commit to anything.

Yes. We work on site regularly, and for some things it is clearly the better option.

• Evaluations — watching how your team actually designs produces a better recommendation than any specification sheet. It is also where we spot the problems you have stopped noticing.
• Implementations — setting up templates, standards and file management works better with the people who will use them in the room.
• Training — on-site training can run on your own parts rather than course exercises, which makes it stick.

Routine support is usually faster remotely, so we will not insist on a visit where a screen share solves it in twenty minutes.

Arrange a visit through the office nearest you, or through your usual contact if you are already a customer.

The one nearest you: Centurion for Gauteng and the inland provinces, Cape Town for the Western Cape, Durban for KwaZulu-Natal.

If you are not sure, or you are outside those regions, use the enquiry form and it will reach the right team. You will not be bounced between offices for being in the wrong place.

One exception: existing customers should go to their usual contact, who already knows your setup and licences.

Yes, through SOLIDWORKS Simulation, which is structural finite element analysis built into the SOLIDWORKS Design environment. Because it runs on the same model you designed, a change to the geometry carries into the study without setting it up again, which is the main practical difference from sending work to an external analyst.

The analysis types available are linear and nonlinear static, frequency, buckling, fatigue, thermal, drop-test, linear and nonlinear dynamic, time and event-based motion, pressure vessel, and design studies for parametric and topology optimisation. Which of those you get depends on the package, covered in the next question.

On picking the right study, see linear vs nonlinear and when it actually matters.

Structural analysis is only part of the picture. Fluid flow and heat transfer are handled by SOLIDWORKS Flow Simulation, and injection moulding by SOLIDWORKS Plastics, both separate products. Flow Simulation results can be mapped into SOLIDWORKS Simulation for one-way fluid-structure interaction and thermal stress studies if you need the two together.

Worth being clear about what simulation is for: it narrows the number of physical prototypes you need and catches problems while they are still cheap to fix. It does not replace testing, and results are only as good as the material data and boundary conditions you give it. That is why we include guidance on setup rather than simply supplying the licence.

Simulation has its own three packages, and they are separate products from the Design packages that share those names.

• Simulation Standard.Basic structural validation, including linear static, fatigue and rigid body motion analysis. Enough to answer whether a part will hold under a known load.
• Simulation Professional.Everything in Standard, plus frequency, buckling, thermal, drop tests and pressure vessel studies.
• Simulation Premium.Builds on Professional with nonlinear and dynamic analyses, for materials that do not behave linearly and loads that vary over time.

The point people get caught by: holding SOLIDWORKS Design Premium does not give you SOLIDWORKS Simulation Premium. Design Premium includes motion analysis and linear stress analysis, which is a useful subset, not the Simulation product. If you need frequency or thermal studies, that is a separate purchase regardless of which Design package you hold.

If you are unsure which level your work needs, describe the failure you are trying to predict rather than the software features. That usually settles it in one conversation.

Yes, but they are separate products from SOLIDWORKS Simulation.

SOLIDWORKS Flow Simulation is a general-purpose computational fluid dynamics add-in that analyses how gases and liquids flow in and around a design. It covers internal, external, free surface and multispecies flows, Newtonian and non-Newtonian fluids, compressible and real gases, and heat transfer through conduction, convection and radiation, with porous media, fans and heat sinks modelled directly. Because it runs inside SOLIDWORKS there is no geometry translation, and an analysis wizard identifies the fluid region for you. Two add-on modules extend it: an HVAC module for comfort parameters and advanced radiation, and an Electronics Cooling module covering Joule heating, heat pipes and PCB generation. Both need a base Flow Simulation licence.

SOLIDWORKS Plasticssimulates how melted plastic flows during injection moulding so defects surface before tooling is cut. It comes in three tiers: Standard checks part manufacturability during design; Professional adds mould design analysis covering single-cavity, multi-cavity and family moulds with sprues, runners and gates; Premium adds cooling line layout and part warpage analysis. Between them they predict short shots, weld lines, air traps, sink marks, gate freeze, clamp force, cycle time and shrinkage.

Worked examples: cooling industrial enclosures with Flow Simulation, and how Plastics reduces the trial-and-error tax.

Which you need follows the physics you are worried about, not the product range. If the risk is a part deforming under load, that is Simulation. If it is overheating or pressure drop, Flow Simulation. If it is a moulded part coming out warped or short, Plastics. Tell us what you are designing and what tends to go wrong, and we will point you to the right one rather than the largest.

With SOLIDWORKS PDM, which stores, finds and shares files from a central location, with version control and workflow automation.

• PDM Standard is for smaller, single-site companies and covers change tracking, notifications, automated PDF creation from drawings and integrated file preview. It is included with SOLIDWORKS Professional, which is worth knowing before you buy it separately.
• PDM Professional is for distributed teams and adds web browser remote access, email notifications, BOM support and multi-CAD support.

See also managing versions and revisions in PDM and how to end version control chaos.

The problem PDM solves is not storage, it is certainty. Without it, teams end up with files on individual machines, several versions of the same drawing in circulation, and no reliable answer to which one is current. PDM enforces check-in and check-out, keeps every revision, and makes the approval route explicit rather than something people remember.

Note that this is different from the cloud file management included with SOLIDWORKS Design. That covers storage and sharing. PDM covers controlled revisions and workflow, which is what you need once more than one person touches the same file.

If PDM is not enough and you need projects, approvals and reporting around the data, that is SOLIDWORKS Manage, covered below.

SOLIDWORKS Manage is the tier above PDM, for teams that need an advanced, records-based system. It carries the PDM capabilities and adds four things:

• Project management — tasks, resources and timelines linked to the design data rather than tracked separately in a spreadsheet.
• Process management — change requests and approvals as structured records with an audit trail.
• Item management — records for things that are not CAD files, so purchased parts and non-modelled items sit in the same system.
• Dashboards and reports — reporting across the above, which is usually what management is actually asking for.

We cover this in why everything after design still falls apart.

The question that decides between PDM and Manage is whether your problem is the files or the work around the files. If drawings get lost or overwritten, PDM solves it. If you cannot answer what stage a project is at, who approved a change or what is waiting on whom, that is Manage.

It is a bigger implementation than PDM because it encodes how your business runs, not just where files live. It is worth scoping properly rather than switching it on and hoping.

Yes, with SOLIDWORKS CAM, an add-on to SOLIDWORKS CAD that lets design and manufacturing teams work in one application and share a 3D model. It is powered by CAMWorks and uses rules-based technology.

There are four editions: SOLIDWORKS CAM Standard and Professional, and CAM Machinist Standard and Professional. What they cover:

• Milling — programming individual milled parts and configurations, high-speed machining, assembly machining, and 3+2 programming for four and five-axis machines in the Professional editions.
• Turning — facing, turning, grooving, boring, cut-off, threading and drilling or tapping, available in the Professional editions only.

See better toolpath creation and VoluMill strategies for what this looks like in practice.

The rules-based part is what makes it different from programming each part from scratch. The software recognises features and applies your machining rules to them, so a second part similar to the first takes a fraction of the time. It also means your best machinist's knowledge is captured in the rules rather than living only in their head, which matters when they are on leave or retire.

The Tolerance-Based Machining and Knowledge-Based Machining capabilities extend this further, reading tolerances off the model to select the right strategy automatically.

If your nesting and production requirements go beyond what CAM covers, MECAD Manufacturing handles that side, including SigmaNEST.

Quite a lot. The portfolio splits roughly by what stage of the work it serves:

• Analysis and validation — SOLIDWORKS Simulation for structural analysis, Flow Simulation for fluid flow and heat transfer, Plastics for injection moulding.
• Data and process management — SOLIDWORKS PDM for file control and revisions, SOLIDWORKS Manage for projects, approvals and reporting on top of it.
• Manufacturing — SOLIDWORKS CAM for CNC programming, SOLIDWORKS Inspection for inspection documentation, and SOLIDWORKS MBD for model-based definition where the model carries the tolerances instead of a drawing.
• Electrical design — SOLIDWORKS Electrical for schematics and their integration with the 3D model.
• Communicating the design — SOLIDWORKS Visualize for photorealistic imagery, SOLIDWORKS Composer for technical documentation and assembly instructions built from the CAD data.
• 2D — DraftSight, for teams who need a dedicated 2D tool alongside or instead of 3D.

Beyond MECAD Systems, the group covers adjacent ground: MECAD Manufacturing handles manufacturing and nesting software including SigmaNEST, and MECAD Technologies handles implementation and engineering consulting.

The useful way to approach this is backwards. Tell us what currently costs you time or goes wrong, rather than which product you think you need, and we will tell you whether a product solves it. Sometimes the answer is that it does not, and a change in process is the cheaper fix.