Heel that Pain, a start-up company in the $200 million US foot care market, has used IBM and Dassault Systèmes Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) Solutions to bring a new innovative product to market at a competitive price.

Heel that Pain is a joint venture between California-based GID Development and Dr Art Smuckler, a certified podiatrist. After developing a few customised footpads for patients complaining of persistent heel pain, Smuckler wanted to share the benefits of these footpads with the mass market.

"I knew this product could do wonders for the 2,5 million Americans who suffer from chronic foot pain, but I was naïve about the complexity of bringing the product to market," says Smuckler. "Then I met with GID senior design engineer James Grimes and he assured me that with CATIA V5 we could take my idea from concept to the store shelves in only a few months."

Using CATIA V5, GID Development designed and manufactured the new heel seats, based on Smuckler's original design. Grimes designed the pads and performed human analysis simulations, testing a variety of materials. Once the optimal design was determined using the software, CATIA V5 was used to design the tooling. Prototypes were then easily manufactured for clinical trials. After a successful series of trials, CATIA V5 was also used to design the blister package.

For more information contact local CATIA representative, Igal Filipovski, CDC (CNC Design Consultants), 011 786 3516, igal@cdcza.co.za, www.cdcza.co.za