Autodesk sees tough times ahead

Autodesk reported good results for the quarter ended October 31, 2008 but spoke ofuncertainty ahead. Since the earnings release happened at the same time as the AutodeskManufacturing group’s industry analyst event described below, I was unable to participate inthe...

Digital prototyping, Autodesk style

Autodesk’s Manufacturing group, headed by Buzz Kross, hosted an industry analyst day inLake Oswego, Oregon this week. Kross and his staff presented Autodesk’s “democratizing”vision for the manufacturing space, tying together industrial design, engineering,...

Webinars 101

I get to/choose to attend lots of webinars, seminars hosted on-line to demonstrate technology, inform participants of new releases or teach attendees about a particular subject. Webinars are invariably interesting, but some organizations are FAR better than others at...

The rest of the story: ANSYS post-conference call

ANSYS held an unusually-long Q3 conference call, as a lot of Wall Street types who wereunfamiliar with the company tuned in for the first time since ANSYS joined several newindices. The company took questions for close to an hour, following the typical presentationby...

What economy? ANSYS turns in another solid performance

ANSYS reported another strong quarter this morning, leading to the preliminary thought thatanalysis tools may not be as affected by the overall economic downturn as other technologyareas. ANSYS reported both GAAP and non-GAAP data, to reflect the affects of the...

MSC beats expectations

MSC Software posted good results today, with total revenue up 11% from last year to $63.7million. Revenue from large deals was up significantly, as both the size of the average largedeal and the number of large deals increased markedly. MSC reports that a year ago...

Uh-oh: Autodesk warns for Q3

Autodesk this morning issued a terse press release saying that preliminary results showthat revenue will be in the range of $604 million to $607 million — far below the earlierforecast of $630 million.The press release contains the following from Carl Bass, CEO:...

PTC not for sale?

On today’s earnings call, PTC CEO Dick Harrison was asked to comment on thewidely-circulated rumor that PTC was for sale. Replied Harrison, "We’re not shopping thecompany." So there.

Earnings: so far, so good

Here we go! The PLM earnings season starts today: so far, 2 of 2 companies have reportedsolid calendar Q3 results but see rocky times ahead. Quick hits:- MSC did not announce earnings (that’s next Tuesday) but did file a series of forms with theSEC about changes...

PLM vs the unions — maybe

There is absolutely nothing I can add to the reams of information and speculation publishedabout the "demise" of the US automobile industry. But an excellent article in the Wall StreetJournal simply cries out for PLMish commentary. The piece, How Detroit...

Siemens Exiderdome meets Boston harbor — Brrr

I spent much of the last two days with Siemens Energy and Automation — part of theSiemens division that now houses Siemens PLM. Siemens brought its exiderdome toBoston for the week, inviting customers, prospects and analysts to tour what is, in essence,a barge...

Oracle acquires Primavera

On October 8, 2008, Oracle announced it was acquiring Primavera Software, the developer of the eponymous Primavera project management application as well as other solutions related to managing contracts and disputes, billing and sourcing. The deal is expected to close...

DASTY to DSY

Sorry about that. Yes, you still can follow Dassault Systèmes shares as they trade on theParis Euronext exchange. Each tracking system will have a slightly different syntax, but thesymbol will be some variant on Paris:DSY. For example, DS’ symbol on Euronext...

From the Nasdaq to Paris

If, like me, you have a little stock chart on your browser screen, you’ll notice a lot of zeroesnext to the DASTY symbol. No reason to panic. Dassault Systèmes (DS) stopped trading onthe Nasdaq as of today, October 16, 2008. That’s not a surprise: the...

CAE bottlenecks are moving

I’ve recently been focusing on CAE: who is using cutting-edge tools, why, where they seeimprovements, where they still have issues. One theme that keeps coming up is that thebottlenecks are no longer where they used to be. As compute power increases to the...

Solid shipbuilding

Say you want to build a yacht and, since you’re a competitive person, you want to be able togloat at Larry Ellison the next time you run into him in Cannes. That means your yachtneeds to be bigger and better than his — or, according to Wikipedia, have at...

PLM stocks battered on Wall Street — why?

So everyone knows that the US Congress on Monday failed to vote to pass a $700 billion billto bail out the financial markets. Whether you’re for or against the bill is irrelevant; its failureto pass cost investors $1.1 trillion. Almost twice what the bill would...

Solidworks, Dassault Systèmes and PTC — Oh my!

It’s been an interesting week. Like you, dozens of emails and press releases cross my desk every day, some of which are far more relevant and interesting than others. Of interest: Bernard Charlés appeared for the first time ever at a SolidWorks-sponsored event – and...

How often is too often?

The length of release cycles continues to be a point of contention between developers and users of engineering technology. On the one hand, developers want to get new releases out there to bring in revenue, deal with competitive issues and fix customer bugs. But users...

Is PTC hanging out the “For Sale” sign?

The Financial Times of London reported on Saturday that PTC has approached GoldmanSachs about selling itself for something on the order of $2 billion. FT cites "people withknowledge of the process" but was unable to get PTC to comment. The article says...