Definition of "computer-aided design" []

• The use of computer programs and systems to design detailed two- or three-dimensional models of physical objects, such as mechanical parts, buildings, and molecules. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Most of the main suppliers belong to these associations, which have been extremely important for disseminating such new concepts as statistical process control (SPC) and total quality control (TQC) in the late 1950s and early 1960s, value analysis (VA) and value engineering (VE) later in the 1960s, and computer-aided design (CAD) in the 1980s.15"