How Siemens' acquisition of Altair has boosted its industrial software portfolio

In March 2025, Siemens completed its acquisition of Altair Engineering, a provider of software for industrial simulation and analysis, enabling Siemens to add new capabilities in mechanical and electromagnetic simulation, high-performance computing (HPC), data science, and AI

The acquisition of Altair and its technology enables Siemens to further advance the most comprehensive digital twin, making simulation more accessible to companies of any size so they can bring their products to market faster.

“We welcome the Altair community of customers, partners and colleagues to Siemens. Adding Altair’s groundbreaking innovations to the Siemens Xcelerator platform will create the world’s most complete AI-powered design, engineering and simulation portfolio. Together, we will help our customers to innovate at the scale and speed that today’s complexity-driven world demands,” says Roland Busch, president and CEO of Siemens AG. “Through the ONE Tech Company programme, we will extend our leadership in industrial software. This enables all industries to benefit from the revolution driven by data and AI.”

Integrating Altair’s capabilities in simulation, HPC, data science, and AI enables Siemens customers to access new simulation expertise, optimise HPC processes, develop new AI tools, and perform data analytics to support innovation and digital transformation for companies of any size.

Peter De Clerck, global head of product marketing, simulation, data analytics, and HPC at Siemens Digital Industries Software, described the acquisition as less about the additional tools and more about closing gaps across the engineering lifecycle. De Clerck explains, “Altair is bringing mainly three big components. Expanded capabilities in simulation (HyperWorks), data analytics and AI capabilities (Rapidminer), and software to manage large supercomputers and cloud computing (HPCWorks).”

It is these additions that strengthen Siemens’ engineering ecosystem, from early concept simulations to digital twins.

THE DIGITAL TWIN AND THE DIGITAL THREAD

The Digital Twin has become a significant principle of Siemens’ long-term vision, De Clerck says, “To be successful as a development organisation in the future, you need to have a digital twin, really a complete digital replica of what you intend to build.”

A comprehensive digital twin enables simulation, testing, and optimisation to be faster and more cost-effective in comparison to a physical prototype. Siemens also believes the digital thread, the seamless movement of engineering data and knowledge across the entire lifecycle, is equally important.

“If you want to create efficiency, it’s crucial to have continuous information throughout the development cycle, production, and even usage,” De Clerck explains. Teamcenter forms the backbone of this connectivity, anchoring simulations, CAD models, requirements and manufacturing data in a single context-rich environment.

The AI age has made it even more critical that engineering data is unified; it is the digital thread that has the potential to enable trustworthy, scalable AI for engineering. As De Clerck states, “If you want to use data to train an AI model, you need to provide the context of how that model was built.”

Altair’s portfolio enhances Siemens’ coverage in various areas, including:

ELECTROMAGNETICS

Electromagnetics is potentially the most significant and most commercially relevant new addition from a physics perpective. De Clerck explains, “Electromagnetics was a big gap we had. Altair closes that gap with high-frequency EM for radar and antenna applications, and low-frequency EM for electric motors.”

As products become more connected and electrified, these simulations are no longer optional; they become central to the design of vehicles, consumer electronics, smart infrastructure, and industrial systems.

STRUCTURAL NON-LINEARITIES AND CRASH SIMULATION

Altair’s Radioss solver provides advanced non-linear deformation capabilities for crash, drop, and impact, which are vital for automotive, aerospace, defence, and consumer product markets.

DISCRETE ELEMENT MODELLING

Discrete element modelling (DEM) is used to simulate granular and bulk materials, an approach that is becoming increasingly important in manufacturing. DEM is utilised by sectors such as battery manufacturing, food processing, and pharmaceuticals.

FROM CONCEPT TO IN-USE OPERATION

The combined portfolio supports every phase of product development, which is categorised into six stages:

• Concept design
• Designer-level simulation
• Detailed engineering
• Physical testing
• Manufacturing simulation
• In-operation digital twins

A GAME-CHANGER FOR ENGINEERING

The acquisition offers several benefits for customers, but none more so than AI-powered simulation: “What’s happening with AI is fundamentally changing engineering. It speeds things up drastically and unlocks design spaces people would never have thought about.”

When neural networks are integrated into simulation processes, engineers can run physics-based simulations to generate training data, then utilise AI to predict outcomes almost instantaneously during design exploration, significantly reducing compute time. Speed is the primary benefit: “Simulation used to be too slow to influence design. Now it can.”

Faster simulation leads to either shorter time-to-market or more opportunities to improve a product before launch. As De Clerck says, “Driving productivity is as important as empowering innovation.”

Together, Siemens and Altair enable faster innovation through unified simulation, AI, and Digital Twin technology.