A Thesis Turned Company: The origins of Adam
Zach Dive
Adam wasn’t always a startup. In fact, it began as my master's thesis when I was studying at UC Berkeley. Throughout my time at Berkeley building in the Jacobs Makerspace I noticed that whilst computer-aided design (CAD) tools were powerful, they were impossibly complicated for the average person.
WIth the emergence of AI poised to redefine software tools, my aim was straightforward: to create CAD intuitive enough that anyone, regardless of experience, could bring their creative ideas into the world as physical objects.
Traditional CAD software felt as though it was built exclusively for professionals, featuring steep learning curves, cluttered interfaces, and endless menus. The aim here was to flip this narrative, posing the question, "What if you could vibe CAD?".
Given my time at Adept (now Amazon AGI), I focused this explorative research on applying the latest advancements at the time in large language models to this problem. It turned out that LLMs can make CAD models for simple 3D mechanical parts through code generation, so given this I made a chat interface for solid modeling.
Adam was born as a prototype, providing a playful CAD interface for users to communicate with naturally through text or adjusting simple parameters to generate, ready-to-print 3D models. Those who wanted to tinker, casually experiment, and quickly make something. Essentially it brought the floor for design down.
However, we now want to bring the ceiling up.What began as an academic experiment quickly demonstrated broader potential and a glimpse into what the future of CAD could look like.
We’re now working on a tool that collaborates with engineers to perform design tasks end to end. It uses text, images, or mechanical drawings to generate feature-rich CAD models right in their favorite platforms.
At its core, Adam remains faithful to its original mission: providing intuitive design tools that amplify human creativity rather than complicate it.
The team is excited about the journey ahead, committed to pushing the boundaries of what’s possible, and grateful for the curiosity that ignited it all.
