Although ISU President Gregory Geoffroy said he believes the gift the College of Engineering received Tuesday is “almost immeasurable” in value, he was able to put a price tag on it.

A price tag of $282 million.

EDS PLM Solutions, of Plano, Texas, donated the multimillion dollar in-kind software grant to be used by students and faculty in the College of Engineering.

“This is the largest in-kind gift, obviously, ever in the history of Iowa State University and in the history of anything in Iowa,” Geoffroy said.

He announced the gift as “truly top-of-the-line engineering software” that merges engineering, design, modeling, analysis and manufacturing into a single process.

Geoffroy said the software given to Iowa State is used by many Fortune 100 companies like General Mills and Lockheed Martin. Having the same tools that engineers use in their field of work will “make our students even more marketable,” he said.

Mike Sellberg, director of product management for EDS PLM Solutions, received master’s degrees in both mechanical and biomedical engineering from Iowa State. He said the software given to the College of Engineering is really a suite of software because it focuses on the entire life-cycle of products — from planning to manufacturing and sales to maintenance.

Two of the main high-technology software companies whose concepts originated from Iowa State’s College of Engineering joined forces to become EDS, he said. The company now trains almost 700,000 students annually, he said.

“I’m really proud as an Iowa State [alumnus] because Iowa State started this,” Sellberg said.

The importance of the gift was not understated at Tuesday’s announcement.

“To sum this all up with one word — wow,” said James Melsa, dean of the College of Engineering.

“Few deans have the opportunity to do what we’re about to do…and that is to accept the most significant gift ever given to the university,” Melsa said.

Tom Ruzicka, senior in mechanical engineering,was shocked with the amount of the gift.

“The number itself is just astounding,” Ruzicka said. “I can’t even fathom that much money.”

He said the software programs the college has now don’t have the capabilities the EDS software does. Students will benefit from this gift because they will be able to learn much more about the process, he said.

“Whenever you can learn a new program, it gives you a better insight,” Ruzicka said.

This announcement adds to the College of Engineering’s “Reach for the Top” initiative to become one of the top 20 engineering programs in the nation by the year 2012.

“Support from external partners is critical,” Melsa said. “While our goals are ambitious, the top is within our reach.”