From commercial building foundations to industrial mats and slabs on grade, engineers worldwide use spMats (formerly pcaMats, MATS) to optimize complicated foundations design, reinforcing and soil-structure interaction.

spMats, formerly pcaMats/MATS, is for analysis and design of concrete foundation mats, combined footings, and slabs on grade. The slab is modeled as an assemblage of rectangular finite elements. The boundary conditions may be the underlying soil, nodal springs, piles, or translational and rotational nodal restraints. The model is analyzed under static loads that may consist of uniform (surface) and concentrated loads. The resulting deflections, soil pressure (or spring reactions), and bending moments are output. In addition, the program computes the required area of reinforcing steel in the slab. The program also performs punching shear calculations around columns and piles.

spMats uses the plate-bending theory and the Finite Element Method (FEM) to model the behavior of the mat or slab. The soil supporting the slab is assumed to behave as a set of one-way compression-only springs (Winkler foundation). If, during the analysis, a loading or the mat shape causes any uplift creating a spring in tension, the spring is automatically removed. The mat is re-analyzed without that or any other tension spring. The program automatically iterates until all tension springs are removed and the foundation stabilizes.