How To Buy Solid Edge

If I were to ask you where I should go if I wanted to buy a license of Solid Edge, what would you tell me? The criticism that Solid Edge resellers are fairly well concealed is one that I’ve heard more than once.

The text book answer is that you should go to the Find a Partner page for Siemens PLM. (Solid Edge calls their resellers “partners” or “reseller partners”.) That page will help you apply several different criteria to find a company that can help you out with your Solid Edge needs.

To help make resellers a little more visible in the community, I’ve started a simple list on the left side of this blog that shows some of the more active English-speaking Solid Edge resellers. (Limited to English only because this blog is in English). If I’ve left anyone out (looking at you, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa) leave a comment, and I’ll add you to my list.

Several of the Solid Edge resellers actually have very valuable websites. Ally PLM has an archive of webinars. Design Fusion has a blog. Majenta has a Tips & Tricks area. Saratech has a blog. Swoosh has a subscription area for customers. Check them out to see who you would like to do business with.

One of the interesting things about Solid Edge resellers is that they do not seem to have the same geographical limits that other CAD resellers tend to have. This is good for the customer because you are not going to be forced to do business with a certain company just because they have an office in your city. In my opinion this is a more modern method that reflects the reality of the digital age.

Did you also know that there are several ways to get your hands on Solid Edge? Not all of them involve a giant purchase order? I mentioned some of these in a previous post.

  • 3DSync – Version with just the 3D Synchronous functions – no 2D and no history
  • Free 2D – Just Solid Edge’s legendary drafting
  • Design and Draft – Gives you Synchronous modeling and 2D drafting
  • Design1 – Version sold by Local Motors for crowdsource projects $20/month
  • Free 45 day trial – There’s nothing like actually trying it out
  • student version – There’s nothing like using legit software
  • monthly subscription – Rent it as low as $130/month
  • just go buy it in one of four levels: Design & Draft, Foundation, Classic, Premium

With all these options, there is something here that you need at a price you can afford.

20 Replies to “How To Buy Solid Edge”

  1. Is there anyone out there in the ether than can help a 71 years ex. engineer transfer his Solid Edge software version 16 on a 32 bit PC over to later Windows 7 64 bit PC.
    I originally bought 8 floating and 2 fixed licences for small company in Gloucestershire.
    Your comments re getting hold of resellers are understated in the extreme – how do these guys sell anything ?
    Pete

    Reply

  2. Hi Matt
    Cadimage PLM supplies and supports Solid Edge in Australia and New Zealand with offices in Sydney, Auckland, Brisbane and Christchurch. Our website is http://www.cadimageplm.com . My involvement with Solid Edge started in 1996 and I ran Cadconsult Ltd supplying Solid Edge in NZ until merging with the Cadimage Group in 2011.
    Thanks
    Andrew Ecker

    Reply

  3. Reply to Dan Staples
    (the website wouldn’t let me reply directly to his comment)

    Hi Dan,

    Thanks for the feedback that is very helpful. I am located in Northern Maine, in the Bangor area.

    Teamcenter looks like it would be overkill for us, but I will look into your Sharepoint solution. Even though that puts me even deeper into MS products. 🙁

    The migration process does sound more reasonable then I expected. So I have more hope about the idea of switching products. I guess I’ll have to download the trial software and start kicking the tires! 🙂

    Thanks again,
    Daniel

    Reply

  6. It took two weeks to get a quotation a couple of years ago. Is there a price list with the versions and the capabilities?

    Reply

    2. Rick,
      Sales guys from every CAD CAM company are pretty anal. There IS a standard price list but they all want you to have to talk to them to get it so they can work their cool sales guy voodoo on you. Then of course there is the shop around and see who is the best at support and then who will give you a deal better than the other guy. I would bet you that you can have quotes from all the VAR’s Matt has listed in under two days though and more importantly you CAN shop around. Other vendors do not allow this and you are stuck with whoever is in your area bad or good.

      Part of the beauty of this On The Edge blog is that policy makers from Siemens and SE read it and they are interested in things that make life difficult or offend potential customers. If you can’t get timely quotes and good service name the names here and what happened and I bet you will get a follow-up on it.

      Siemens and SE have gone through a couple of rounds of getting rid of bad VAR’s and the one who offended you in the past may not be there anymore or have had an attitude adjustment. Believe it or not they do worry about customer perceptions

      Reply

  7. LMGi is my reseller. I’ve always said, when it comes to Solid Edge, if Rick, Jason and Stewart don’t know it, it’s not worth knowing. These guys are always there for me when I run into a problem with Solid Edge and are especially kind and gracious when the problem is actually me. They put the “value” in VAR.

    18
    Ocean St.
    So. Portland
    ME. 04106
    P 207-774-7300
    F 207-774-7308
    866-465-6185

    http://www.tlmgi.com/

    Reply

    1. Hi Matt,

      By chance did you have to switch from Solidworks to Solid Edge? If so, did they help you migrate your data?

      Thanks,
      Daniel

      Reply

          1. Hi Ken,

            Thanks for the link that was very helpful. I wish it discussed Enterprise PDM in the process though.

            Daniel

      2. Hi Daniel
        I did not have to switch from SolidWorks, however I have on occasion had to open up SolidWorks part files with Solid Edge. Solid Edge was able to open them flawlessly. As for mass data migration, no, I have never had to do so…guess I’ve been fortunate in that respect.

        Reply

        1. Hi Matt,

          Thanks for the answer. It’s good to hear that simple file imports work well. We have thousands of Solidworks files that are managed with Solidworks Enterprise PDM. So I’m concerned that Solid Edge can handle maintaining all the file relationships, revision management, and Data Cards. It’s something that I would need to have confidence in, before I considered switching.

          Reply

          1. PDM does complicate things a bit — doesn’t it always! 🙂 Solid Edge offers you two choices for your PDM. One is Solid Edge for Sharepoint — this is PDM built on a Sharepoint core. And of course Teamcenter, the most popular PDM in the industry. Both support revisions, and non-cad content etc. so should match up fine versus Sworks Enterprise. Solid Edge runs equally well with either one and either might be a fit for you.

            As far as transitioning the PDM data, I won’t blow smoke and tell you its easy. On the other hand it may not be as hard as you are imagining. Most systems (including Sworks Enterprise I presume) do property syncing with the file itself. That is, they keep the file props in the SolidWorks file up to date with whatever the database says. If this is true, then the standard approach is to export the files from the Sworks DB to the file system and then import them into Sharepoint or TC — either will extract the props from the file and put them in the DB.

            Again, it is not a cake walk, but its not rocket science either and most of our partners have experience in this domain. Where are you located?

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