The Pro edition includes 2.5D, 3D and 3+2 milling, and 2D turning applications. Inventor HSM standard includes 2.5D, 3D, and 3+2 milling applications. However, Inventor HSM ($7,500 perpetual or $1,125 a year) and Inventor HSM Pro ($10,000 perpetual or $1,500 a year) both include a copy of the CAD program Autodesk Inventor.

Like the free HSMXpress for SolidWorks, Inventor HSM Xpress offers 2D and 2.5 D programming for free, but you’ll need to have your own copy of Inventor to use the plug-in.

This week, the correction comes in the form of Autodesk Inventor HSM, a CAD-CAM bundle that includes both Autodesk Inventor design software and CAM features. At the same time, the lack of an Inventor-integrated HSMWorks became an imbalance that needs to be corrected.

The fierce competition between SolidWorks and Inventor notwithstanding, the new owner vows to keep HSMWorks interoperable with SolidWorks. It was by Autodesk, which owns SolidWorks’ CAD rival Autodesk Inventor. HSMWorks eventually did get bought, but not by Dassault. The only way the SolidWorks-HSMWorks integration could have been tighter was for Dassault Systemes, SolidWorks’ parent company, to acquire HSMWorks. Even the “-Works” in HSMWorks, I suspect, might have been the creators’ deliberate tie to SolidWorks in branding. The computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) program was best known for its tight integration with SolidWorks’ CAD program.

For a long time, HSMWorks for SolidWorks was the envy of Autodesk Inventor users.

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