Information has been a bit slow to come out regarding the PTC Creo announcement from yesterday, but I’ve finally found a good description of what exactly they’ve done.  Essentially, it’s a 2-fold announcement.  First off, they’ve created a wholly inclusive product that combines CAD, Simulation, Verification, and Design Management all into their product.

For instance, a Creo app for a manufacturing engineer will include capabilities for validating tool paths for a suggested design concept and can run machining simulations while the analyst’s app will be optimised for data analysis supported by direct modelling visualisations and the service planners app will interact primarily with engineering software to display detailed assembly and disassembly processes.

This is a great addition to any CAD product, and runs the risk of encroaching on territory traditionally owned by companies like ANSYS.  We’ll have to wait to see just how good the simulations are, but no doubt they’ll continue to improve them over time.

The other one is they’ve adopted a highly modular approach.

Selling the bitesized applications (possibly from an Apple style online ap-store) will make it easy for small organisations to buy just the applications they need for their current priorities and although specific pricing will not be clear for some time yet, a PTC representative said yesterday at a London press briefing that the intention was to make the cost meet a level that a manufacturing or design manager could sign off from their personal budget without the need for capital approval.

This is in sharp contrast to approaches taken by companies like Maxon, who have abandoned module design in favor of product suites.  Seems everyone is being bitten by the “App Store” bug.  Personally, I think it’s great for end-user consumers, but bad for professional users.  A few thoughts:

  • A Professional wants to just Buy the Product and be done with it.  Not have to go back and buy module A, then module B, then module R.
  • Business offices & Finance types want to plan for the 1 big buy of the product, and be done.  Thoughts that the pricing makes it under capital approval is a short-lived affair, that’ll be quickly ‘fixed’.
  • It makes large-scale deployments a nightmare for systems administrators.  Rather than a single install & deployment, it’s a collection of little apps that all have to be pushed out and maintained.

For the casual user or educational institution, it’s a big win.  They can get just the few modules they need, and save their precious cash and disk space for other stuff.

All in all, it sounds like PTC is making some great strides forward in the CAD market.  Beta’s will be available in Spring 2011, with a short-lived 1.0 in the Summer and 2.0 in the Autumn.

via Alerting all CAD users! – The Manufacturer.com – Promoting best practice in Manufacturing.