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Opinion by Ralph Grabowski
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A year ago at Solidworks World 2018, Dassault Systemes promised Solidworks users that it endorsed two pillars: Solidworks and 3dExperience. The two-pillars announcement was important, because two million Solidworks users had been rejecting Dassault's pleas to switch to its 3dExperience line of software. Users saw no benefit in paying a lot more annually for cloud-based CAD programs with a different user interface running on a proprietary database incompatible with existing Solidworks models and that weren't even shipping necessarily. So, the two pillars was Dassault's acknowledgement that the desktop Solidworks software was important to users.
(Much to Dassault's chagrin, they had in 1997 acquired not only the most successful mid-range 3D modeler, but also one that keeps getting more successful. In 2018, for the first time more than 80,000 licenses of Solidworks were sold -- about double the next closest competitor, assumed by me to be Inventor from Autodesk.)
Dassault is the biggest of the CAD vendors, this year expecting to earn revenues of US$4.6 billion. It has a single R&D department spending US$650 million a year and employing 41% of the workforce. With its CGM solid and surface modeler, Dassault has arguably the most powerful CAD code out there, offering 12 "brands" (its name for software) in 11 target markets, including one as non-CAD as fashion. (See figure 1.)
Figure 1: Dassault's 3dExperience collection of software involves 12 components (all images sourced from Solidworks)
From Solidworks World to 3dExperience.World
Dassault offered Solidworks users a compromise. In exchange for them getting to keep their permanent-licensed desktop software, they should branch out to adjacent CGM-based software. But here Dassault was unhelpful to the cause: it would announce CGM software designed for Solidworks users, and then either cancel the project or else delay the launch, sometimes by years.
The fantasy of two million customers paying expensive 3dExperience subscriptions annually for a single code base (called "V6") is, however, too delicious for Dassault to abandon. And so the keynote speeches by executives at last year's Solidworks World 2018 were all about 3dExperience. This year at Solidworks World 2019, the keynotes were all about 3dExperience. And the keynotes at next year's...
Well, there won't be a Solidworks World next year. Dassault renamed it 3dExperience.World. The traditional black backpacks handed out this year were already emblazoned with 3dExperience.World. CAD editor Roopinder Tarainterviewed a Dassault vice president who anticipates 30,000 attendees at next year's event, up from this year's 6,000. I anticipate 600.
The change in name tells us that Dassault is fed-up. Corporate executives had patiently painted pictures of the bright new futures in which all aspects of CAD are unified into a single whole, where everything happens in an instant, looking dreamy and swooshy. Approving designs wirelessly in the back of a black Uber speeding through the canyons of New York City: what's not to like?
This year, however, the tone changed from the previous brightly-patient to something more like exasperated-plaintive. Keynote speaker after speaker explained to the wary audience the many years Dassault has spent developing this wondrous software; the many thousands of employees who have worked so hard on it ("Hand of applause for the R&D team sitting right over there"); the many software programs ready to be deployed, if only.
Solidworks CEO Gian Paolo Bassi pleaded to the crowd, "We always promised you to broaden and deepen our portfolio solutions; we always told you we would integrate everything that we do, whether it is desktop or the cloud. We also promised to give you choice, to help you at your own pace, to give you flexibility. I hope you recognize that we made good on all those commitments." (See figure 2.)
Figure 2: Solidworks CEO Gian Paolo Bassi during a keynote speech
When Mr Bassi and Dassault Systemes CEO Bernard Charles paused during their speeches to wait for applause, at times there was none. At one point, one of the two muttered "Thank you, thank you" to the muted ballroom.
Mr Bassi admitted, "You are a tough crowd." Then he tried flattering his audience: "You have very, very high-end requirements. Your designs are becoming ever more sophisticated. You want the confidence of multi-physics simulation. You expect zero defects at the design stage. You want all your businesses processes beautifully integrated. You want excellence in each step and you want full digital continuity. You want to ignite the Industrial Renaissance."
I think that Solidworks users might be more interested in better ways to construct complex fillets than igniting the next Industrial Renaissance. As attendee Dwight Livingston wrote afterwards on the Solidworks Forum, "Gian Paolo Bassi loves my passion. I am pretty sure he says that every convention. But my passion is Solidworks, not 3dExperience."
Confusion Over 3dexperience.Works
"3dExperience" is a trade mark that Dassault uses to describe its collection of software. Mr Bassi unveiled a version of it specific to Solidworks that he called "the first big message of Solidworks Word." It is named 3dExperience.Works and consists of the following programs:
- Envoia for planning
- Solidworks for designing
- Simulia for simulation
- Delmia for manufacturing
How they work together was not explained. Mr Charles followed him with the second big announcement of the conference: "Because this noble mission is so significant to make this world a better world to live in, we need to expand the possibilities that we offer to you." He unfortunately confused matters by describing a different kind of 3dExperience.Works that consists of two programs:
- Solidworks for design
- Demliaworks ERP for enterprise resource planning
- ... [The ellipses are in the slide shown the audience]
Demliaworks is a new name for ERP software that Dassault recently acquired from IQMS. About 60% of IQMS' 1,000 customers already were using Solidworks. It is meant for mid-market manufacturers to make lots of different products, manage their inventory, and handle regulatory requirements; it runs on the factory floor and in the accounting department ."We want to make ERP and design easy to use, deploy, and exploit in your companies; [Demliaworks]is going to do the world of ERP what we did with Solidworks," exclaimed Mr Charles.
About xShape and xDesign
When we see names of Dassault software that begin with 'x', then we know that they represent a third set of programs offered to Solidworks users. I think the 'x' is short for "crossover." In short, you open the Solidworks model in one of these programs, do some modeling around it, and then bring the result back to Solidworks.
xShape is a new deformable sub-division surface modeler that uses Dassault's CGM kernel and runs in a Web browser. It is due to ship this summer. (See figure 3.)
Figure 3: xShape for Solidworks does deformable surface modeling
xDesign is a solid modeler that also uses Dassault's CGM modeler in a Web browser. Dassault has been announcing it for several years now, but now at least its Web page finally works. If you have a MySolidworks account, you can apply to test the beta at https://my.solidworks.com/try-xdesign.
Figure 4: xDesign in beta
xDesign isn't, however, a single program; it is a collection of apps that create 3D designs, manage data, assign tasks to teams, and collaborates through the 3DSWYM Community site. Designing with it is very different from Solidworks; you can get a flavor of it from this entry at the official Solidworks Blog:
"Not sure if you want an extrude or a revolve? Doesn’t matter with Super features; you can swap back and forth, and even go to a sweep instead, if you like!
Need some help with the shape to get the loads you require? Design Guidance is there to do it the scientific way with a simple step-by-step process.
If you are not sure whether you should start a part or an assembly, no problem. xDesign has the flexibility to chop and change at any point in the design and change back again.
There are also no files, so you can rename features, parts or assemblies without the fear of breaking references."
During Dassault's conference call last week, a financial analyst asked, "As part of your [financial] guidance for 2019, to what extent have you included a [revenue] contribution from the new xApps [like xDesign] or the Marketplaces?" CEO Bernard Charles replied, "I think this year is more a market introduction." I first wrote about xDesign in 2016, which back then was promised to ship in 2017.
What's In Solidworks 2020?
Traditionally, the highlight of Solidworks World occurs on the third day, when staff proudly show off many of the wonderful new features being worked on for the next release. This is when attendees in the huge conference hall go into repeated cheers and applause.
This year, however, Dassault removed the most popular event from the schedule. The only features shown in Solidworks 2020 were faster operations for loading models, doing sketches, and handling large assemblies.
What Ralph Grabowski Thinks
Dassault Systemes is able to land the world's largest clients, like aircraft and automotive manufacturers, but not the world's largest pool of MCAD users. Dassault software always was designed for use by the likes of Boeing and Airbus, not the one-man shop.
That's what Solidworks works well for: the lone designer who spends his time completing relatively uncomplicated parts, never needing the cloud, except for maybe Dropbox. His conceptual design tool is a pencil and paper; his design tool is Solidworks on the desktop; and the machine shop and his customers are local, not global. This is the reality Dassault doesn't accept, so it seems.
Executives display their disconnect by piling emotion on to the "experience" tag line, which already is vague enough:
"And now the topic for years to come is to add emotion, to add the connection between what you deliver to the people, and why people love what you deliver: we call it 3dExperience," the Dassault CEO told his silent audience. "...because with the 3dExperience, you are going to become story makers. The story will be the experience."
Today in North America, if you want a job in MCAD design, you most likely need to know Solidworks. It's a snowball that became an avalanche, and I worry over what Dassault will do next to try to slow it down.
www.dassault3ds.com
[Reprinted with permission from Design Engineering magazine.] |
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| Here are some of the most recent posts made to the WorldCAD Access blog:
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PTC slides into the red with $44 million in losses for Q2, using traditional GAAP accounting methods, partly due to the company spending $27 million to move its headquarters from Needham MA to swanky Seaport, the sudden decline in ALM and SLM sales, and an insufficient number of salespeople for its IoT line of software.
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Dassault Systems Q1 revenues were US$1.05 billion, with sales up:
- SOLIDWORKS software +5%
- CATIA software +6%
- ENOVIA software +19%
- Other software +21%
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LISP is the new Java. After Bricsys last year hit LISP development out of the park with BLADE, ZWSOFT last week revealed it's working on Lisp Debugger "to debug and modify lisp programs easily."It is available for testing in the first beta of ZwCad 2020, which you can download from zwsoft.com/zwcad/beta-overview
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Siemens Digital Industries Software releases Parasolid v31.1 with convergent modeling, Siemens' term for working with facet data and B-rep models at the same time. This is the holy grail, hard to do, and is also being worked on by Dassault's Spatial division and C3D Labs. Note that all three are will working on making facets and solids work smoothly together; this is a long-term programming project.
The new Parasolid release supports 64-bit Android hardware, plus has lots of other enhancements that can be read about at community.plm.automation.siemens.com/t5/Knowledge-Base/Parasolid-Version-31-1-Release-Highlights/ta-p/576985
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IMSIDesign releases TurboCAD 2019 with customizable ribbon, a construct similar tool, hatching of gapped boundaries, three new blend types, extrusion of 3D polylines and 3D curves, a BIM palette that shows the BIM structure, new rendering engine, and more. www.turbocad.com/turbocad-windows/turbocad-2019-professional.html
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Russian translation of my interview with Open Design Alliance president Neil Peterson (on their new Web-based SDK [software development kit] for CAD systems) is posted at Isicad and translated by Elena Semukhina: isicad.ru/ru/articles.php?article_num=20501
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With Dropbox putting use-limitations on free accounts, an alternative to consider is pCloud from Switzerland. They offer 6GB free storage with automatic uploads, 10GB after inviting friends and performing other tasks. I particularly like the one-time lifetime pricing of $175 for half a terrabyte of storage. www.pcloud.com/cloud-storage-pricing-plans.html (see below).
Box doesn't allow automatic uploads with free accounts, and Google doesn't offer the function at all. I use auto uploads for photos and screen grabs a lot, something that both Dropbox and pCloud offer.
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I have worked with homeless people and so I know that throwing money at the "problem" is ineffectual. Money doesn't fix drug addiction and mental illness. KOMO-TV does a pretty good job in examining the issue in Seattle, showing the associated problems and a describing possibly effective solution: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw
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Looking back to April, 2000: the launch of Revit (when it was still independent, except for all the investor money, some of which came from Solidworks folk). The launch party took place at Harvard University.
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