By Brad Holtz on 3/13/2009

Had an intersting chat today with Jay Vleeshhouwer, formerly of Merrill Lynch. For those few of you that don't know him, Jay is a grand master "sell-side" analyst, on of the few who actually cover our industries as a market, rather than just dabbling in a few of the stocks from our sector.  The conversation turned to the economy, the automotive sector, then to Chrysler and the recent NY Times article about Chrysler's cutback in its design staff.  Jay made the following interesting observations:

"These changes at Chrysler may put, or has already put, some pressure on Dassault’s US auto recurring revenues (for CATI, its largest product), albeit low-single digit percent of total business…..maybe offset to some degree with non-US usage. Dassault Systemes is probably the most heavily exposed to auto as a vertical. Generally speaking, for the group, besides the obvious pressures on new license sales, we’ll need to keep an eye on maintenance too. It’s conceivable for instance that in the April quarter, Autodesk’s...

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By Brad Holtz on 2/21/2009

We had an unexpected surge of registrations for COFES this week. Net result is we're sold out of our block of rooms at The Scottsdale Plaza Resort. We've arranged for overflow at the Hilton Scottsdale Resort. If you register now, we'll book you at the Hilton and then move you over to The Scottsdale Plaza Resort if space becomes available.  Feel free to call us if you have any questions. 

Check out http://cofes.com/participants to see who's registered.

By Brad Holtz on 2/13/2009

I saw an amazing presentation while I was at TED last week. Several amazing ones actually, but this one is both relevant to our community and available for viewing. Take a look at David Merrill’s Shiftables at http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/david_merrill_demos_siftables_the_smart_blocks.html

By Brad Holtz on 1/27/2009

Our own Dick Morley is interviewed on NCMS Radio. Listen to him talk about the invention of the floppy disk, the PLC, etc. It's an interesting chat.

http://www.ncms.org/blog/post/09-ncmsradioep5.aspx

By Brad Holtz on 1/26/2009

Information Week just published an article on users who are choosing to abandon their maintenance contracts for Oracle and SAP

http://www.informationweek.com/news/software/erp/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212902014&pgno=1&queryText=&isPrev=

Our industry is also at risk for this type of push-back. Do you know how much of your maintenance fee is rolled back into development? Ask your vendor. Let me know how we're doing as an industry.

By Brad Holtz on 1/26/2009

Last week, Cyon Research published its 2008 CAD/PLM Survey. The survey takes a deep look at industry buying preferences. Lots of detail and deep insight. More information on the $1,995 survey is available from info@cyonresearch.com.

 

By Brad Holtz on 1/26/2009

Maieutic Parataxis was a big hit at COFES 2008. We filmed the event and have just made the 5-minute presentations viewable by the general public at http://cofes.com/mp

Take a look. 

We're seeking candidates for Maieutic Parataxis at COFES 2009. Let us know if you've seen something we should consider.

By Brad Holtz on 5/23/2008

Here's all you need to know about the Autodesk vs. Vernor ruling:

1. Software "licenses" where the customer pays upfront a single fee for perpetual use of the software, with no obligation to return the software, must be treated by the courts as if it were a sale. Therefore the application of copyright law follows the first-sale principle.

2. Software vendors can get avoid have this ruling apply in any one of several ways.

a. renting the software. The Autodesk vs. Vernor ruling interprets a fully paid up perpetual license as a sale. If the license is not perpetual and fully paid, the interpretation of sale would not apply.

b. require the customer to return the software at the end of use.  This would leave open the possibility of negating one of the conditions of the Wise decision on which this ruling is based.

I recommend the following CADCAMnet article for additional reading: http://www.newslettersonline.com/user/user.fas/s=63/fp=3/tp=47?T=open_article,969809&P=article 

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By Brad Holtz on 5/1/2008

I was at COE earlier this week when HP announced their new blade workstations. As a courtesy, I attended HP's product release reception, where I had the "opportunity" to learn about the announcement.  I was expecting to be politely bored.   HP is not the only company out there with a solution (IBM was showing its own workstation blade server at COE too.) But who cares about a workstation blade?

Well, now I do. This technology is a game changer. It addresses very real issues of security, intellectual property, centralized maintenance, access to power on demand, and can remove heat and noise generation to remote areas where they are not problematic and perhaps even beneficial. 

Resist the urge to ignore. Take a deep look at workstation blades -- I expect you'll be surprised too.

By Brad Holtz on 1/5/2008

Cimatron acquired Gibbs for $5M in cash and $4.5M in stock.  That's about 75% of revenue, or about 7x income. Gibbs and Cimatron have suprisingly little overlap in their customer base.

The combined company has a current market capitalization of about $22M on a combined $30M revenue stream. When compared with most stocks on the Cyon Research Index, this is quite low. But Delcam, a direct compare for Cimatron, has a market capitalization of $45M on sales of about $60M. So the question to ask is: why are pure-play stocks in this sector so poorly valued?