Autodesk Fusion 360 for Groovemade Design Company

In Portland, Oregon, the team at Grovemade has spent the past seven years perfecting designs for phone cases and desk objects like keyboard trays, pencil cups, and monitor stands. The woodwork that has become their trademark is finicky, difficult, and endlessly detailed. During the design process, the Grovemade team typically goes back and forth between CAD and physical models. That process starts with sketches, cardboard models, and mockups made from blocks of foam or wood, then iterates back into the software as they add details. The team loves how Fusion 360 combines CAD with CAM. That seamless integration makes it incredibly easy — and fast — to make changes in the design and then machine another prototype immediately using their in-house CNC equipment. “We need to be able to make changes quickly and try it again,” the owner Tomita explains. He adds that they routinely go from CAD to CAM to machining to holding it in their hands all in the same day — “which is absolutely incredible.” Grovemade used to work with a combination of different 3D design and CNC packages, Tomita says, “but the software was so time-consuming that we wouldn’t do [prototyping] a lot of times.” Fusion 360 gave them an all-in-one application that, besides being far less expensive, allowed them to avoid that friction and go straight to machining anytime they want. And because it’s all integrated, they don’t have to worry about migrating design changes across multiple pieces of software. “If we change one thing, we don’t have to redo it on the other,” Tomita says. “It’s pretty massive.” All in all, he adds, Fusion 360 “fits right in with the scale of our business”.