From the inbox

Dec 9, 2010 | Hot Topics

Today’s blog post is a mishmash — none of it worthy of an entire post but all in answer to emails you’ve sent:Why doesn’t this blog allow comments?There is too much incivility on the web — not that you, personally, would be rude or disruptive, but that guy...

Update: Daimler chooses NX for Smaragd

Dec 3, 2010 | Hot Topics

Update: I’ve received a number of comments on this post, so am republishing with annotations. New material is in blue since italics seems to not work in some browsers/readers. Most significant are Daimler’s comments in the second paragraph.This week saw a rather...

Galileo describes infrastructure

Dec 1, 2010 | Hot Topics

I’ve been attending Autodesk University from the comfort of my little office, via the Autodesk Virtual conference at au.autodesk.com. While there are many, many things to blog about (such as: it’s super cool, but who really needs WiFi on the Pi bicycle shown during...

Daimler chooses NX for Smaragd

Nov 26, 2010 | Hot Topics

This week saw a rather strange battle of the press releases: Siemens PLM announced that Daimler AG will phase in NX as its standard for worldwide vehicle development starting in 2012. Dassault Systèmes followed a short while later with a press release that said this...

GIS in a 3D explosion

Nov 17, 2010 | Hot Topics

There’s a lot going on in the GIS space but for those of you who don’t follow it, here’s a quick refresher. GIS stands for Geographic Information Systems; this technology is also often known as “geospatial”. GIS’ analytical tools enable uses to associate data and...

PTC: One size doesn’t fit all

Oct 29, 2010 | Hot Topics

Yesterday the PLM world finally got a look at what PTC has been teasing for months.  The good: PTC focused attention on CAD and articulated the problems many users have with traditional tools.  The bad: PTC had hyped this launch to such an extent that nothing short of...

The Advantage of Packs

Oct 25, 2010 | Hot Topics

Autodesk recently announced a number of Subscription Advantage Packs that are designed to make the subscription program more attractive to customers and to quickly get new features out to its most loyal customers. A quick recap: Roughly 40% of Autodesk’s total revenue...

News bits: 3D, clouds and more

Oct 19, 2010 | Hot Topics

Still trying to catch up from nearly a month of personal and business travel, so here are a few interesting things from my overflowing in-box: Autodesk commissioned a survey of online consumers that showed that the majority prefer to examine potential purchases in 3D...

Quick catch-up: what you may have missed

Oct 7, 2010 | Hot Topics

Goodness – I go away for a few days, and the PLM world keeps on spinning ;-) Here’s what happened while I was away: Avatech Solutions (now part of Rand) reported revenue of $31.3 million for the fiscal year ended June 30 2010, down from $35.4 million a year ago....

Rand and Avatech merge in reverse

Aug 18, 2010 | Hot Topics

Surprise! Rand Worldwide and Avatech Solution announced on Tuesday that the companies have been combined in a reverse merger. A reverse merger is often known as a “reverse IPO” because the acquisition of a public company by a private one avoids the costly process of...