WorldCAD Access

"Bricscad for AutoCAD Users" now available in Russian

Sabit Software did the hard work in translating my "Bricscad for AutoCAD Users" ebook into Russian.

нига Ральфа Грабовски «Bricscad для пользователей AutoCAD» (You can download a copy from here): www.sabitsoft.ru .

If you wish to support the author (me!), then you can purchase the 144-page ebook for $21.60 from www.upfrontezine.com/b4a (or clicking the PayPal button).

Jay Vleeschhouwer on active CAD seats, Autodesk sub numbers

by Jay Vleeschhouwer

You ran two interesting stories this week, one on the active CAD users and the other on ADSK’s most recent results.

In terms of the former, in a report earlier this year, I noted that the active maintenance base of 3D CAD seats was in a range of 925,000-1.0 million, as of the end of 2009, including, for instance, 133,500 Pro/Engineer seats and about 220,000 Solid Works seats. Catia would appear to have the largest number of such seats, accounting for roughly just over a fourth of the industry base.

In addition, I calculated that the annual maintenance revenues for such seats was about $1.25-$1.30 billion. Dassault therefore would have the largest active base in the traditional 3D CAD market, i.e., planes, trains and automobiles. My numbers by the way do not include educational seats.

If the 4 million total industry active base mentioned in the story is correct, then it’s highly likely that the bulk of those consist of Autodesk products when we consider that more than 4.6 million seats of AutoCAD seats have shipped since inception, including more than 1.6 million “vertical” versions, such as Map, Civil, Mechanical, and so on (that amount would not be the same as current active seats of course, but keep in mind that AutoCAD very likely surpassed Inventor as Autodesk’s largest maintenance revenue product some time ago).

In addition, more than 4.1 million seats of AutoCAD LT have shipped since inception in 1994 although the maintenance retention is probably relatively low as compared with the higher end products. We can infer from the previous disclosures that the base to date for Revit may now be in excess of 300,000 copies of the different configurations they offer.

In terms of the Autodesk results, your numbers are correct but incomplete. For instance, the company noted that the effect of the upgrade pricing change was an incremental $15 million for the quarter. Presumably, without that amount upgrades revenues would have been only about $36 million, down 16% year/year and a mere 8% of revenues.

More interesting is that maintenance billings were down only 3% from the record set in the preceding quarter ending January 2010 and up 26% year/year (to what I infer was about $223 million, the second-best maintenance billings quarter to date).

Recall that maintenance revenues reported now are always an artifact of cumulative billings and that in FY10 (the January 2010 fiscal year), billings were down year/year for the first three quarters of the year and down 7% for the whole year. This year the billings should see a double-digit recovery; upgrades will likely see a temporary bump this year but then resume their long-term decline.

How many CAD users are there? I mean, active CAD-using users (Updated)

Jon Peddie Research created a stir last year when it figured that there might only be about four million [see update] active CAD users in the world. Their researchers spent a bunch of time looking at a variety of source materials, and then came up with the number that was horrifyingly low for an awful lot of us in this industry. 

Last month, another researcher determined that something like 25% of a CAD vendor's claim of customers are active users. This was based on determining how many had paid-up subscriptions, especially those aligned with CAD vendors who demand annual remittances. Naturally, the percentage is somewhat higher for expensive CAD systems, lower for cheaper ones.

Update

Kathleen Maher of Jon Peddie Research corrects me:

I saw your debate about actual CAD users and I saw that you were using old data that we talked about several years ago. Those numbers are indeed low and do not reflect the installed base.

We just published a new report in which we put the yearly upgrade/purchase numbers at 4.22 million for 2009 -- down considerably from 2008 at 5.47 million. I don't think there's going to be a huge increase in 2010, but 2011 should see a rise as industries recover. 

(This does not translate, necessarily, to people leaving the industry since people will make do with what they have until they feel they can afford to upgrade, renew their license, or buy new software.)

From Jay Vleeschhouwer, we learn that the active maintenance base of 3D CAD seats is in a range of 925,000 - 1 million, where 3D CAD consists of the heavyweights, ranging from Inventor and SolidWorks to Pro/E and Catia.

Spatial explains why no JT in InterOp Release 21

It has sent a mild shock wave through the industry: Spatial is not supporting Siemens' JT format in InterOp Release 21.

(InterOp is the 3D model translation API that lets other CAD vendors and third-party developer read formats like CATIA, SolidWorks, and Inventor, for import into their CAD systems. Spatial is owned by Dassault Systemes.)

I asked product manager Vivekan Iyengar to provide my readers the reason for this decision:

 We introduced support for JT format during the R20 service pack cycle based on published JT Open specifications by Siemens. The specifications published by Siemens are for JT file format v8.1, but there are older and newer versions of JT file for which the format specifications have not been published.

 We have come to the conclusion that without the format specifications available for older and newer versions of JT format, it does not fit with our overall 3D InterOp goal of producing high quality manufacturable ACIS models. This is the reason we are no longer offering JT as a supported file format for 3D InterOp.

So, we pass the ball over to Siemens PLM Systems.

Autodesk subscription numbers -- in its own words

Autodesk has 2,383,000 customers on subscription, the sum being of educational + commercial users. This number is up 5% from a year ago (adjusted for the mid-2010 addition of educational seats).

In Q1, Autodesk recognized $195 million in revenues from subscriptions, up 7% from a year ago. Works out to $327 per customer, on an annualized basis.

("Recognized," because Autodesk has to split the annual subscription payment it receives from customers over four financial quarters. For this reason, $492 million is deferred to future quarters.)

$51 million was revenue from upgrades in Q1, a number that's 50% higher than the average, due to the 2011 release in March. And 18% higher than a year ago.

So we have upgrade revenues up by 18%, and subscription revenues up by only 7%. Perhaps this is why Autodesk has been talking up subs on blogs.

Source.

Other trademarks opposed by Autodesk -- and by others

Searching the US Trademark and Patent Office, we come across many battles over names. Most surprising is the battle over 3DS, the shorthand name by which Dassault Systemes refers to itself. 

- - -

AUCAD proposed by IMSI/Design, opposed by Autodesk, now in limbo: "Abandoned - No Statement Of Use File"

DWGCRUISER proposed by ORDIUS, opposed by Autodesk, now cancelled.

AUTOMATIONDESK registered by dSPACE GmbH, opposed by Autodesk, still registered by dSPACE.

3DS registered by Dassault Systemes, opposed by Autodesk in 2003, perhaps due to its similarity to 3d studio, now "Abandoned - After Inter-Partes Decision" [made by both parties before a decision was rendered].

3DS MAX claimed by Autodesk, opposed by NU LIFE (a dietary supplement company) in 2003, current state unclear.

AYCAD claimed by Aydin Controls, opposed by Autodesk in 1989 for being too similar to AutoCAD, terminated by Aydin in 1991.

AUTOWARE claimed by Automated MLD Design, opposed by Autodesk in 1989 for being too similar to AutoCAD, abandoned in 1991 "After Inter-Partes Decision"

CA LAB claimed by Autodesk, opposed by Computer Associates for being too similar to CA-DRIVER, abandoned in 1993 "After Inter-Partes Decision"

DWG UNPLUGGED claimed by Autodesk, opposed by Viacom 1997 for being too similar to  Unplugged, abandoned in 1998 by Autodesk for "No Statement Of Use Filed."

DESIGNSCAPE claimed by Autodesk, opposed by ANSYS in 1998 for being too similar to DesignSpace, both gave up in 1999,

OBJECTARX claimed by Autodesk, opposed by Wall Data for being too similar to ObjectX, abandoned by Wall Data in 1998, registered by Autodesk.

AUDIODESK claimed by Mark of the Unicorn, opposed by Autodesk for being too similar to Autodesk, Autodesk's claim dismissed in 2000 by the USPTO.

The press release as JPEG

As a newsletter editor, I received dozens of press releases a day. They arrive in a variety of formats. I'm listing them here in order of my preference:

 - embedded in the email as regular text.
 - attached to the email as a DOC or DOCX file.
 - attached to the email as a PDF file.
 - a hyperlink in the email that directs me to read the release on the company's Web site (why make me go through this extra step?).

But most odd are press releases from Rapidform of Korea, who attach press releases as DOC files and as JPEG image files, as illustrated below. I find it interesting that the JPEGs tend to be half size of the DOC files.

This week in upFront.eZine: HP's 3D printing strategy & Archicad R14

From this week's issue of upFront.eZine:

1. All About HP's Strategy for 3D Printing

2. ArchiCAD 14 Solves the BIM Roundtip Problem 
       - Architectural BIM Engages Engineering BIM

Plus tidbits of other news in "And in Other News." You can read all about the business of CAD at www.upfrontezine.com/2010/upf-647.htm

Tech Soft 3D relaunches Adobe's TTF libraries in July

It had been rumoured for many months, and now the two are admitting it. Adobe has xferred its xlators to Tech Soft 3D, who says that...

...the ex-TTF office and employees stay in Lyons.
...related Adobe staff are to be hired by Tech Soft 3D.
...the PDF 3D publisher SDK and translators will be renamed and relaunched in July.
...Adobe will continue to support 3D in Acrobat, but you now need to get the translators through Tech Soft 3D.

Source

Italian Mac site posts screen grabs, video of Autocad 2011 apparently running on Mac OS X

AutoCad Per Mac Beta Nativo!! Vivo!! cries Italiamac with the first screengrabs proportedly of AutoCAD running on Mac OS X -- no Parallels. To read the page in English, click here.

Brief video tutorial on using the touchscreen and Apple's Majikmouse is on MacRumours.com

Is it faked? I think so. Autodesk alphas and betas are in English, with other languages coming out around FCS. The Getting Started dialog box contains mostly placeholders, which I find odd, since it is done in Flash, thus OS-independent. The screen grabs are easily faked. The 3D rotation in the video is very rough, and not something Autodesk would want to show off. In the video, the multitouch motions for the screen differ from those used by the Magicmouse, which is illogical.