A new CAM package with a long heritage

Developed by HSMWorks ApS of Denmark, the HSMWorks package has been on the market for only two years, but it had been in development for much longer than that.

When multi-core microprocessors became available in 2002 and 64-bit architecture was just being released, the people at CIMCO Integration I/S in Denmark, who had been developing CNC programming, simulation, editing and communications software as well as other add-in technologies for machine tool manufacturers and CAM developers, wanted to develop software products that would take advantage of the increased capabilities the new technology offered. Those software developers had been working on add-in technologies since 1991.

The problem they ran into in designing the HSMWorks software was that all of the existing CAM kernels, the core of any CAM package, had limitations that made it very difficult to use the full potential offered by what was then the new 64-bit, dual-core microprocessor architecture.

Most of those existing kernels were developed for 16-bit architecture, then ported to 32-bit architecture, and their capabilities diminished further being ported to the new 64-bit architecture.

A new kernel designed specifically for 64-bit dual- or multi-core processors was needed.

Normally, CIMCO would have developed the new kernel, then offered it to its existing CAM development customers as an add-in product. However, the software developers realized that a new kernel was only half of what was needed to use the full potential of the latest computer technologies.