Dr. Várady provides perfect complement to Geomagic’s proven expertise

Rarely does a company have a world-recognized visionary behind its products and technology. Geomagic has two.

In the fall of 2003, Geomagic merged with Hungary-based Cadmus Consulting. Dr. Tamás Várady, former CEO and president of Cadmus, was named chief technology officer of Geomagic.

Former director of the Geometric Modeling Laboratory and senior research fellow at the Computer and Automation Research Institute of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (SZTAKI), Dr. Várady is internationally renown for his work in the field of continuous geometry. In a career spanning more than 25 years, he has co-authored 72 research papers, won a Fulbright Scholarship, and been awarded a Doctor of Science degree by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

“Our founder, Dr. Herbert Edelsbrunner is one of the world’s foremost experts in what is known as discrete geometry,” says Ping Fu, president and CEO of Geomagic. “Dr. Várady is one of the world’s foremost experts in a field known as continuous geometry. Rarely have two such experts been teamed together outside of academics. Not only have we united technology that gives us leading-edge software solutions, we are blessed with visionaries who have proven that they can transfer great research into great products.”

Pioneering research

Dr. Várady joined SZTAKI after graduating in 1976 with a degree in electrical engineering from the Technical University of Budapest.

“In the mid-seventies, SZTAKI was an inspiring intellectual center of extremely bright individuals,” says Dr. Várady. “Although the Institute was somewhat handicapped by the socialist economy and the embargo policy, the state generously subsidized the Institute. We were able to conduct free research in a fantastic atmosphere.”

While at the Institute, Dr. Várady’s pioneering work included the integration of surface and solid modeling in the early 1980s, generating rolling-ball-type and free-form blends in the mid-1980s, free-form surface representation with general topology and n-sided patches in the late 1980s and early 1990s, and vertex blending in the mid-1990s. He started to investigate the problems of reverse engineering of shapes in 1994, focusing on segmentation techniques, curve and surface fitting, and automatic model creation for free-form and conventional engineering objects.

“I always liked geometry; in particular, non-regular, aesthetic shapes and 3D,” says Dr. Várady. “I found it exciting that after designing a mathematical algorithm, I could immediately check the results of my ideas on the screen of the graphic display. Geometric modeling seemed to be an ideal field to combine theoretical work with practical engineering.”

SZTAKI was the main academic home to Dr. Várady, but he also served as a visiting professor at Arizona State University and completed the Fulbright Scholarship at Purdue. He counts his years at Cambridge University’s engineering department between 1982 and 1984 as a fundamental period for his research.

“In the early 80s, Cambridge was an exceptional opportunity for a young researcher from a socialist country – especially at the beginning of a career,” Dr. Várady says. “I was already experienced at surface modeling, but in Cambridge I learned the fundamentals of solid modeling as well.”

Free enterprise conceives Cadmus

In 1990, the end of socialism brought many changes to Hungary and SZTAKI. No longer able to freely spend money, the Institute had to reduce staff in response to new market forces. While the capitalist economy brought challenges, it also afforded Dr. Várady the opportunity to create a small spin-off venture called Cadmus Consulting in 1991.

“My former team was split in two parts: a non-profit research group remained in the Institute, and Cadmus Consulting was created to continue our software development activity – mainly consulting and high-tech contract programming for West European and U.S. companies,” says Dr. Várady. “The two organizations worked together in tight cooperation for 13 years, until the merger with Geomagic.”

As president and CEO of Cadmus Consulting, Dr. Várady continued to guide groundbreaking research and software development into reverse engineering of shapes. The software Cadmus created helped customers and partners such as Hella Germany, Deskartes, 3Space Ltd., Delcam, Steinbichler Optotechnik, Spatial Technology, BMW and Curventa Softworks.

According to Dr. Várady, reverse engineering of shapes was one of the most significant areas of research and development for the Institute and Cadmus.

“This research brought the widest international recognition for us in the academic world,” he says. “It also led to the opportunity to join Geomagic.”

Realizing a personal dream

At the outset of 2002, Dr. Várady had been in his dual roles as the head of SZTAKI’s research lab and the managing director of Cadmus for 12 years. Commercial success depended upon establishing a global organization, but the post-September 11 business environment made it difficult to run a small company in Hungary when most clients were located in other countries.

Geomagic co-founder Dr. Herbert Edelsbrunner visited Cadmus Consulting for the first time in 2002 to see Dr. Várady’s research and the technology developed by his team first hand. Realizing that Geomagic and Cadmus would be stronger together than as separate companies, the two began to discuss a possible merger.

In October 2003, the completed merger established a rare match – not only did the two teams complement each other, but the founders shared the same vision. The unification of Geomagic and Cadmus brought together different technologies and talented people, helped Geomagic expand into Europe, and fulfilled Cadmus’ goal of becoming part of a global company.

“Accepting the invitation to become CTO of Geomagic realized a personal dream,” says Dr. Várady. “I have watched the majority of exciting technological breakthroughs come from the U.S. in the last several decades, and I was tempted several times to leave my country and pursue a career in the United States.

“Cadmus has become part of a successful U.S. organization with a very good reputation and excellent individuals,” Dr. Várady says. “The Hungarian team is creating products for the world market and I am in the challenging role of guiding technological development for Geomagic. I am able to focus, as I always wanted to, on the technology and its importance to industry.”

In addition to his duties as CTO, Dr. Várady also serves as managing director of Geomagic Hungary, Geomagic’s fully owned subsidiary. The former Cadmus engineers have joined Geomagic’s software development team and also provide technical support to European customers.

“While Geomagic was very strong in point and mesh processing, Cadmus had a leading position in advanced surfacing,” says Dr. Várady. “Integrating the two knowledge bases benefits all of our customers and paves the way for more innovation.”

The first Geomagic product stemming from the work of Dr. Várady and Cadmus is Cadmus Fashion, software that extracts design intent into a CAD model. Cadmus Fashion produces high-quality, trimmed NURBS models from polygon models or 3D point-cloud data from a physical part. It allows industrial designers to re-create the original surface aesthetics that are often lost when using a global tiling approach or less sophisticated lofting algorithms.

“Cadmus Fashion extends Geomagic’s reach beyond accurate replication of a physical product to generation of stylish surfaces commonly used in automotive body design and consumer products,” says Dr. Várady. “Functional decomposition within Cadmus Fashion revolutionizes reverse engineering for surfacing and industrial design.”

It isn’t the first time that Dr. Várady has been at the forefront of technological advancement, and given his past achievements and the new opportunities ahead of him, it will be far from the last.