The value of the agreement was not disclosed, but one analyst said the deal could ultimately be valued at more than US$100 million over the next four years.

Under the deal, Nissan and its affiliates will use UGS's PLM systems to design and build its next generation of vehicles, according to the companies. Nissan will deploy the software as part of a fully integrated, common research and development infrastructure within the company, according to a statement.

"The way the technology is helping them to do that is it offers them what they view as the next-generation, system-level approach to do car design," said Bill Carrelli, vice president of strategic marketing at Plano. Texas-based UGS. "So for them this is more than a [computer aided design] selection -- this is a vehicle-development selection [so they can] design and develop cars at a high system level."

Tokyo-based Nissan declined to comment on the deal.

Carelli said UGS's technology will allow Nissan to automatically validate and simulate these vehicles early on.