Description
Autodesk is an American multinational software corporation that makes software products and services for the architecture, engineering, construction, manufacturing, media, education, and entertainment industries. Autodesk is headquartered in San Rafael, California, and features a gallery of its customers' work in its San Francisco building. The company has offices worldwide. Its U.S. locations are California, Oregon, Colorado, Texas, Michigan, New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Its Canada offices are located in Ontario, Quebec, and Alberta.
The company was founded in 1982 by John Walker, who was a coauthor of the first versions of AutoCAD. AutoCAD, which is the company's flagship computer-aided design (CAD) software and Revit software are primarily used by architects, engineers, and structural designers to design, draft, and model buildings and other structures. Autodesk software has been used in many fields, and on projects from the One World Trade Center to Tesla electric cars.
Autodesk became best known for AutoCAD, but now develops a broad range of software for design, engineering, and entertainment—and a line of software for consumers, including Sketchbook. The manufacturing industry uses Autodesk's digital prototyping software—including Autodesk Inventor, Fusion 360, and the Autodesk Product Design Suite—to visualize, simulate, and analyze real-world performance using a digital model in the design process. The company's Revit line of software for building information modeling is designed to let users explore the planning, construction, and management of a building virtually before it is built.
Autodesk's Media and Entertainment division creates software for visual effects, color grading, and editing as well as animation, game development, and design visualization. 3ds Max and Maya are both 3D animation software used in film visual effects and game development.
