Solid Edge continues to make noise
The guys over at Solid Edge are continuing a push to introduce their product to a CAD industry in turmoil. While other vendors are solving problems that don’t exist, Solid Edge is giving users good options. Here’s what’s going on at SE now:
Design1 is a subset of Solid Edge that Local Motors and Siemens are making available to “enthusiasts” working on Local Motors projects. You pay $20/month for the synchronous-only (direct edit) software. If you want real CAD software, this is one way to do it. It’s also a great way for Siemens to introduce a lot of people to the software.
The second thing is that — and be careful, because I’m gonna use the “c” word — Siemens has created a new web-based (cloud) JT viewer for the use of the Local Motors community. JT is an ISO standard lightweight 3D format for visualization and data transfer. According to the Wikipedia link, it can hold anything from facet display data to full nurbs and meta data. There is a JT viewer, although the interface looks a little WinNT-ish, it does work well, and the JT file sizes are relatively small. The issue of cloud insecurity is not a problem in this case because the data is publicly shared anyway (remember the rule of thumb to only put on the cloud what you would be willing to give away).
Solid Edge is also calling attention to their existence and the fact that the new Solid Edge software is really worth checking out with the 45 day trial. Not sure how much time is left on this offer, but if you’re at all curious, do yourself a favor and check it out. This is the full-blown SE, not the Design1 subset.
Another thing you need to check out is the webcast they did with Helena Labs. You’ve heard Billy Oliver before. He has been on this blog as well as in other Siemens press releases. The part I found most interesting was Dan Staples talking about kernel change. His part starts at about the 23 minute mark to about the 40 minute mark, followed by some canned demos. Dan’s a straight shooter, and I think you’ll be able to relate to what he has to say. By the way, there’s a discussion on the SW forums about the kernel change stuff. Matt West isn’t a bad guy, but he’s getting caught in the crossfire on this one.
Add to this the buy-one-get-one deal, and you’ve got a lot of (positive) noise coming from the Solid Edge guys. It’s great to see a company continuing to develop a good product, engaged in the discussion, and trying to respect their customers. That’s all you can ask of anyone.
Someone accused me earlier of being a Solid Edge salesman or something like that. I’m not. I am just advocating for a company and a tool that I believe is headed the right direction, and seem to be making better business decisions than their competitors.
It is good to re-read the Deelip link. I would be nice to believe that SolidWorks would evolve well if they did not leave conspicuous, serious geometry bugs around for five years. I just had to delete and redo a complex surfacing part when Solidworks forgot how to rebuild the part. I just changed one dimension by an inch. I could not even use the same type of features.
I post more here, using my Mac, when Solidworks has hung my computer and Windows is rebooting. So I might have some exta attitude.
I am going to try some complex surfacing in SE.
Remind me about to this link : http://www.deelip.com/?p=5327
I did actually comment on the 2 for 1 deal on this blog before. Neil, I, and people like me, are not trying to get something for nothing. 2 for 1 is only a good deal if you need 2 licenses. I would be more impressed by a half price offer on one.
This is Matt’s blog so he is free to recycle new stories as he wishes. I enjoy popping in here and commenting from time to time – even if I do get a fair bit of stick for it 🙂
But as long as Matt continues to let me post comments I will continue to try to offer a view from my side of the fence and raise things which perhaps he is not aware of – so Neil I’m not picking on Matt or anyone else. Over the years I have learned a lot from this blog – both from Matt and other commentators, and although I don’t necessarily agree with all of it I still consider it to be a valuable resource.
One of the reasons I don’t share the enthusiasm for SolidEdge is that I know it won’t do the job for me as I make extensive use of SolidWorks surfacing tools, TSplines add ons, Zygotes Human modelling add on and DriveWorks Xpress – none of which are available for SolidEdge. We also have some long term contracts that are set up as master models linked to history and I know (because I have tried) that direct editing – of any sort – cannot deal with this (as Matt himself has pointed out). Also, in the UK, SolidEdge is too costly to justify, and NX is something like £20k plus around £3 to £4k a year for the packages I would need.
From my perspective, if I were to switch, Autodesk looks like a better value proposition (as Mathew says, the product design suite includes Alias Design, 3D Studio Max, Mudbox, Showcase etc all for under £9k). Even Pro/E or Creo offers better options here (and despite what the twitternet might say Pro/E is a damn good system – everybody I know who uses it models very complex stuff and it works – their patterning tools, for example, are fantastic).
SolidEdge just does not have a large user base in the UK – I know 2 people who have it (and they bought it over 10 years ago for sheet metal). Everyone else I know uses CATIA, SolidWorks or Pro/E. But popularity does not influence me (given my software history I would think was obvious!). The only think that influences me are functionality for what I need to do, and price. OK one more thing does as well – -familiarity and interface. I don’t have time to spend weeks or months learning something. One of the reasons I’m not keen on Inventor is the use of dialogue boxes that pop up for simple functions that in SolidWorks you can directly edit graphically, or via the feature manager.
OK, enough, back to work!
Somehow I dont believe Matthew would download SE 😉
I wonder why I didnt get a sales call a week later?
I must say though I’ve never heard of a 2 for 1 seat deal for SW myself.
I’m only aware of some discounts on upgrades, at least in this part of the world.
My VAR did offer one of those for SW2012 again recently.
Thats 2 promotions in a short time. Things must be extra tough for SW VARs atm with the depression and the uncertainty about SW future.
I suppose any sort of sale helps to get the unit stats trending up for Matthew to report. Obviously its better to tempt someone with a deal rather than to hang tough and make no sale at all.
Perhaps there is a subtle difference overlooked here in that SW are hoping to retain customers despite themselves whereas SE are trying their best to gain new ones by raising their profile.
I wonder how the graphs for the number of seats sold and upgrades would look if they didnt discount at all. Matthew can probably tell us but I am not sure we could believe his figures. 🙂
The only reason I updated to SW2009 was because it was ‘cheap’.
I bet thats the case for a number of people who were put off by SW2008.
I guess this partly explains the slight rebound we saw from the sudden low in SW fortunes.
Most likely the sales for SW2012 will be artificially bolstered by discounting as well…and SW2013…and…well until it dies out.
Of course the cloud will change all that. Revenue will certainly be consistent no matter what the economic circumstance or state of the software.
I bet SWv6 users are going to be paying a lot more that $20/month too… $250?? well that would be a bit too scary to start with…um…$165 at intro?
If there is any consistency lacking its going to be supplied in buckets by DS customer lock in.
@matt
I have to agree with Kevin, I’m often hearing about deals along the lines of 2 for 1 from resellers (including SolidWorks). Autodesk recently released their Design Suites claiming over 50% savings on grouping together a range of programs like Inventor/Alias/3dsMax/SketchBook and even upgraded a vast group of users from lower level packages to some of the higher ones all for FREE. They also do 30 day free trials without the need to contact resellers. They all have their deals. No mention of them though!
Even then (as was the case when I downloaded the Solid Edge trial) you get the typical sales call a week or so later so inevitably you’re going to have to talk to a reseller one way or another.
As for Solid Edge Design1, it was only a week or so ago you wrote that users and manufacturers weren’t getting value out of the “Crowd Sourcing” scheme, stating that “a lot of people were going to do the work, and only one was going to get paid for it”, turns out that a lot of people are going to do the work, no-one is going to get paid for it and you’re going to have to pay $20/month to participate in it.
Matt, where’s the consistency in all of this?
Matt isnt shouting, he is recycling some general news as a filler while he concentrates on his new project I think. Why pick on Matt for a lack of SW news coming out of DS?
I think I am right in saying SW first started on their cloud mission about 5 years ago.
Since then we had one failed demo and one failed application out of them and witnessed a few notable departures of personnel in rather unusual circumstances.
Apparently they still have no time line for delivery and have no practical details worked out to share with their increasingly perturbed customer base.
Say the first release is still 2 years away, thats one long time to be writing code and not be selling any. Its kind of hard to understand why it is taking so long if they basically just have to take Catia, trim the too good for mid-range bits off it and drop a browser skin on it. They must have significant problems with performance or something. Not very confidence inspiring anyway.
To think too that this is apparently a gradual replacement of SW and it will take some time to reach the same level of functionality as the present solution. Factor in stagnant SW development and it doesnt make for a happy settled user community.
You cant really blame folk for looking around elsewhere in the meantime especially those who dont like the data issues and rent as you go business model of the cloud.
There is only so long you can expect people to watch empty space and disengage their brains. Unfortunately this is taking on all the hallmarks of an epic fail even if you try to ameliorate it with handpicked statistics.
If Matt notices SE are actively promoting their wares and he knows disaffected users are looking around for alternatives to the cloud but based on the same core as SW why not write about it?
Gets me though how people dont think 2 for 1 is a good enough deal for fairly expensive software.
Always someone wanting to wangle something for nothing… 😉
@Kevin Quigley
I’m not surprised you’ve got some criticism even of good stuff. Buy one get one is a price reduction for people who can take advantage of it. Simple. I don’t get the complaint here. 45 day trial is nice because getting the license code is animated, and you don’t have to mess around with calling people or waiting for someone to respond. Or worse yet, going through all the conditions that salesmen are going to put on a trial license. Again, there is nothing negative about it.
I’d also welcome a “replacement” discount. These are all positive. I don’t see any exploitation here, or any trickery, or any reason to complain.
Matt with all due respect, how do any of these things offer users good options? Buy one get one free is a regular sales tactic in the industry. Spaceclaim had this offer running the month before. 45 day trial? Anybody can get an extended trial if they ask for it. Customer of mine has just done a 3 month SolidWorks and Inventor benchmark. The LocalMotors thing has not exactly got of to a good start and in any case othe vendors offer research licenses to worthy ventures. Auto desk in particular are very pro active in this respect.
Now if Siemens PLM were to turn around and offer SolidWorks, Inventor or Pro/E users a competitive upgrade for the cost of one years subscription THAT would be worth shouting about and a positive move for users. If the software is that good we will all want to stay on subs and they will recoup the investment in ongoing subs and training.
@Rick McWilliams
Rick,
I’d love to have a conversation with you and look at some of your models to see just what SE is missing (if anything) for your work. You can contact me at dan.staples@siemens.com. Just drop me a line and we’ll get hooked up.
I knew about the kernel change through Dezignstuff a long time ago. It’s kind of amusing that this issue has just now popped up on the SWX forum. When I last spoke to a tech support – he didn’t know about it at all. He actually didn’t know what a kernel was. As for the cloud – it is entirely conceivable that almost all computer applications will be cloud based in ten or twenty years. CAD is so expensive, and piracy so easy that it just makes sense. What I don’t understand (and Matt discussed this in another post) is the need for us (as professional draftspeople) to EVER use a lesser ‘mid-range’ tool. NX just flat out works. The history based modelling and synchronous stuff is awesome. Just very expensive. In Australia we can claim this cost back on tax over a period of years, is it not the same in America. You still have to stump up the cash in the first place however.
Wow, Solidworks future is clear as mud. My translation of this is: you are invited to pay subscription for the same old Solidworks geometry bugs indefinitely. You may at some time be able to pay even more for new even buggier V6. Customer driven?
Solid Edge just needs to improve the complex surfaces and I will change over.
I like what you’ve posted about SolidEdge, thanks.
Devon
I wish more companies would release trial versions or “crippled” (can’t print or save>) version of their software.