ICMD® Materials Design & Engineering Platform
QuesTek’s revolutionary SaaS platform allows clients to simplify and accelerate solutions to materials challenges, from processing to production, saving valuable time and resources.
Accelerate Materials Innovation with Confidence
ICMD® is QuesTek’s digital platform for simulation-led materials design, decision-making, and qualification. It enables engineering teams to predict how materials will behave across composition, processing, and service conditions before committing to costly testing or long qualification cycles.
Built on nearly 30 years of ICME leadership, ICMD® helps organizations move from trial-and-error development to Digital Once engineering.
Grounded in QuesTek’s proven Materials by Design® technology, ICMD® combines physics-based modeling, simulation, and real-world metallurgical expertise to bring predictive accuracy and speed to every phase of the materials lifecycle.
How Industry Leaders are Using ICMD®
ICMD® Delivers Measurable Impact
- Up to 70% reduction in physical testing
Physics-based simulation narrows design space early, significantly reducing the number of experiments required for development and qualification. - Faster development and qualification timelines
Earlier insight into materials behavior allows teams to make confident decisions sooner and avoid late-stage redesigns and delays. - Lower overall development cost
By reducing experimental iterations, rework, and schedule risk, ICMD® helps teams control materials development and qualification costs. - Higher confidence in minimum performance
Location-specific, process-sensitive predictions reveal performance variation that averaged material properties often miss. - Earlier, higher-quality decisions
ICMD® delivers actionable insight while designs are still flexible, enabling better tradeoffs across performance, manufacturability, cost, and risk. - More effective use of R&D resources
Engineering effort shifts from trial-and-error testing to targeted validation, improving productivity without increasing headcount or lab capacity.
Powered by Materials by Design® Technology
At the core of ICMD® is QuesTek’s proprietary Materials by Design® technology, a proven, physics-based approach to materials engineering that integrates computational modeling, thermodynamics, and real-world data to accelerate innovation.
This approach replaces traditional trial-and-error development with predictive design and simulation, allowing users to understand how composition, processing, and microstructure will affect material performance, before physical testing begins. That means faster timelines, lower costs, and materials that are tailored for their intended environment from day one.
Materials by Design® has been successfully used to deliver patented, high-performance alloys in aerospace, medical, automotive, and energy sectors, many of which are now commercially deployed and flight proven.
Recognized for Excellence in Materials Engineering
Powered by Materials by Design® Technology
At the core of ICMD® is QuesTek’s proprietary Materials by Design® technology, a proven, physics-based approach to materials engineering that integrates computational modeling, thermodynamics, and real-world data to accelerate innovation.
This approach replaces traditional trial-and-error development with predictive design and simulation, allowing users to understand how composition, processing, and microstructure will affect material performance, before physical testing begins. That means faster timelines, lower costs, and materials that are tailored for their intended environment from day one.
Materials by Design® has been successfully used to deliver patented, high-performance alloys in aerospace, medical, automotive, and energy sectors, many of which are now commercially deployed and flight proven.
Supported Materials Systems
Physics-based materials simulation
ICMD® uses validated, physics-based models to predict microstructure evolution and resulting material properties, enabling teams to understand why a material behaves the way it does, not just observe outcomes after testing. This supports higher confidence design decisions and reduces dependence on costly physical iteration.
Integrated alloy design and optimization
Engineers can digitally design and optimize alloy compositions to meet competing requirements, such as strength, fatigue resistance, burn resistance, corrosion performance, or temperature capability, before committing to melting, printing, or forging. This shortens development cycles while expanding the viable design space.
Additive manufacturing–focused process modeling
ICMD® simulates key AM phenomena including thermal histories, solidification behavior, and microstructure formation linking process parameters directly to performance outcomes. This helps teams anticipate defects, variability, and qualification risks before a build begins.
Printability and process window mapping
The platform generates printability maps that identify stable operating windows for AM process parameters such as laser power and scan speed. These maps guide engineers toward repeatable; high-yield builds and give manufacturing leaders clearer process controls for scale-up.
Fatigue and lifecycle performance prediction
Advanced fatigue modeling enables prediction of material behavior under realistic service conditions, reducing reliance on long, expensive fatigue test campaigns. This capability is especially valuable in aerospace, energy, and other safety-critical industries where qualification timelines drive cost and schedule risk.
Microstructure-to-performance linkage
ICMD® connects composition and processing decisions directly to mechanical performance metrics—such as strength, fatigue life, and durability—allowing teams to evaluate tradeoffs early and avoid late-stage redesigns driven by unexpected test results.
Making materials predictable – QuesTek is an Ansys Technology Partner
ICMD® works alongside Ansys simulation tools to turn materials from assumed inputs into predictive, designable variables enabling faster decisions and higher-confidence performance simulation.
ICMD® supplies predictive, microstructure-aware material behavior that informs Ansys simulations, closing the loop between materials design and system performance. Simulations are only as good as the materials behind them.
Explore ICMD® in Practice
On Demand Webinars
On-demand webinars highlight real use cases that show how ICMD® helps teams streamline materials development and accelerate decision-making.
Featured webinars below demonstrate how the platform is applied across materials systems, manufacturing processes, and performance challenges, reducing iteration, focusing experimentation, and shortening development timelines. Examples span prominent, materials-intensive industries including aerospace, space, energy, advanced manufacturing, and nuclear. For broader exploration, the full webinar library includes additional recordings across industries and applications.
Platform Requirements & Security
- Secure web-based platform
- Secure cloud access to thermodynamic and mobility databases from CompuTherm and QuesTek, with support for Thermo-Calc licenses
- ICMD® uses AWS Cognito for user authentication, which supports Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) for best security and (optionally) SAML to enable Single Sign-On (SSO)
- Each ICMD® instance is segmented on an AWS Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) to ensure confidentiality and data integrity
- Secure and restricted access to subscriber uploaded and generated data
View QuesTek’s Security & Compliance Page
ICMD® Software Subscription Terms and Agreements
- ICMD® SaaS Terms and Conditions
- ICMD® Privacy Policy
- ICMD® Service Level Agreement
- ICMD® Professional Terms and Conditions
- ICMD® Non-Solicitation of Employees
QuesTek export control compliance
QuesTek maintains an export controls internal compliance program, including training for all employees. QuesTek also implements an export control compliance process for all customer transactions.
All versions of QuesTek products have an ECCN of EAR99.