Virtual Prototyping - New Information Techniques in Product Design

International competition is characterised by the reduce of the innovation time. Therefore the success of new products strongly depends on the necessary time for their development. Virtual Reality, a new 3D human-computer interface accelerates significantly the processes of creating and handling 3D data in 3D space for design and evaluation purposes. The paper outlines required system tools for the design and evaluation of new products based on Virtual Reality techniques. The goal of these tools is to enable interaction in an intuitive and easy way with a virtual product. Furthermore tools have been developed for the support of co-operative work in a virtual environment.