The CAD Insider

PTC Succession Plan was a Succession Episode

In the HBO hit series, Succession, the CEO of a company that WayStar RoyCo was going to acquire, turns the tables, jump over everyone who thought they were next in line to succeed Logan Roy and secures the CEO post for himself.

It was a tale that played out in real life in our industry just last week when it was announced (titled “PTC Announces CEO Succession Plan,” no less) that Neil Barua, CEO of ServiceMax, acquired by PTC, was going to be the company’s next CEO, jumping over many a PTC executive who thought they had the inside track.

Nobody saw either the Succession or the PTC outcome coming. Lukas Matsson, usurper to the WayStar RoyCo throne, admitted his company, GoJo, had “questionable numbers.” It’s subscriptions in key geographies had been wildly inflated. Matsson was a Swede with a dot com. What did he know about America, the business of a media company. Barua, born of Indian parents, has a finance background. What does he know about design and engineering software? ServiceMax’s subscriptions may not be inflated but the last quarterly statements found (September 2021) show quarter after quarter of losses.

Yet, Logan Roy chose to pay a premium for a company that would expand his reach beyond it core businesses. Similarly, Jim Heppelmann, CEO of PTC, paid $1.46 billion for ServiceMax, about 10 times ServiceMax’s estimated annual revenue.

PTC's Heppelmann Makes A Gutsy Move with Creo

LAS VEGAS, NV (PlanetPTC 2011), June 14, 2011 – A chance to address your top customers is not an opportunity to be missed. CEO Jim Heppelmann has taken the main stage during the annual PTC user group meeting. He wastes no time. He talks fast.

“I’m an engineer,” Heppelmann tells us.  He has already been introduced as a tinkerer, someone with a “big workshop” who “loves to visit customers.” It’s a tough sell.  The crowd has been rather reserved. It is their second or third day in Las Vegas. By now people are moving a bit slower in hallways of the mega-complex that is Caesar’s Palace casino. I’ve had to go around them.  I guess even engineers just wanna have fun. It is Las Vegas, after all. Don’t ask; don’t tell. During breakfast, the coffee runs out.

Heppelmann has been in the top position for 9 months. He replaced Dick Harrison, who is nowhere to be seen. 

So what does Heppelmann bring to the show, his first big public user gig as CEO? A boundless energy, for one thing.  His words come quick, like a machine gun. Only once did he stumble and that was over which one of the new PTC products does what. But who isn’t confused?

PTC has blown up the old brands Pro/E and CoCreate in favor of a myriad of Creo products. Why would PTC throw a grenade in its own house? One might argue CoCreate, a MCAD also-ran, might have needed a boost. But why mess with the venerable Pro/ENGINEER? Why “abandon a name that's synonymous with 3D?”* If anything, change the company name. The “Parametric” in PTC no longer tells the whole story.

Heppelmann tells how sales had been stagnant for years. A high level meeting was called. Hard questions were asked. Those who suggested the status quo was due to a mature market were challenged with the question: “Have all the problems been solved?”

But it was a rhetorical question.  A trap.

“No, they have not,” he answers himself. “These products are fundamentally hard to use! It was the elephant in the room.”

He is not done. The problem was deeper.

“Once upon a time, we were the innovators.  We had a great product. We had the only product. Somewhere along the way we became complacent."

“We have the best parametric modeler in Pro/E,” he said. “We have CoCreate.” He lists other PTC applications. “Why don’t we think outside the box, put all them in the blender and see what frappe comes out?”

Those that didn’t share the vision may no longer be in PTC’s employ. Heppelmann had climbed to the his vaunted position to wait for consensus. “Only 2 of our executive staff were there 2 years ago.” I'm thinking if you don’t agree with Heppelmann, you don’t stick get to stick around too long.

Heppelmann is on a roll. He is taking a shot at the term CAD itself.

“We don’t call it CAD anymore. I think we can assume that all design is now computer aided.  It’s not 1970.”

Elephants. Frappes. Questioning “CAD” itself.  Amidst the distraction of wildly clashing metaphors, a lapse into subjects that usually put me to sleep (PDM, ERP), shaking the bedrock of TenLinks (a CAD site) and typical CEO bombast (“We are the leader and we’re opening our lead”), I have to mentally withdraw to preserve my sanity. But I think I’ve got what I need.

Basically, PTC, under Heppelmann, has put all its wood behind the new products. For better or worse, the old brands are going away. The new programs (apps) are smaller, lighter...modern!  It’s a move that ought to be applauded.  Sure, the hard core Pro/E users will bitch. However, most CAD insiders have been saying for many years that PTC needed to wake up and react to its shrinking influence in the market it once owned. PTC was the frog in the pot of water slowly heating, but never summoning the will to jump.

Well, the frog has jumped. We can guess how it will land, to be sure, but credit must go to Jim Heppelmann for not only recognizing the need to adjust course, but also being able to push it through the organization.

---

See entire keynote, PTC Corporate Strategy & Customer Executive Panel Discussion

*Sean Dotson, on Twitter

PTC Reinvents Itself with Creo

PTC had been promising something really big for a few months. As a couple of hundred people sat in anticipation, klaxons go off and convicts in orange jumpsuits invade the packed room. Expecting some corporate cheerleading and some dreary PowerPoint, I'll bet more than a few in the audience probably soiled their undies as several badasses got way too close before they were safely locked up in a cage.

The prisoners were metaphors for the creativity, interoperability...properties imprisoned by present CAD systems, for which Creo, PTC's new suite of products, was a sure cure.

You can watch the whole thing here: http://events.cramerwebcast.com/ptc/20101028/video/default.htm

A warden looks over prisoners, each representing creativity, interoperability, etc. They are about to be rescued by PTC's Creo

Can you blame PTC for such theatrics? These days, it takes a lot to be heard over the noise. Every new technology is introduced as the next big thing. A couple of weeks ago, the big thing was Solid Edge, who had just come out with the 3rd version of Synchronous Technology. The CAD intelligentsia pretty much agreed Siemens had it right, and if only people knew about it, Solid Edge was going to rule the world. Surely, Solid Edge was the next big thing. A few months ago, Dassault had blown up the IntelliCAD/AutoCAD-compatible/DWG-editing market with DraftSight. It was FREE! Wasn't that going to turn the world upside down?

It is into this world that PTC introduced Creo. This really is the next big thing, they are saying. Excuse us for going all Vegas on you but we have to wake you up and shake you. You see all those products that we've had for years? Pro/ENGINEER? CoCreate? Well, forget about them. Sure we spent millions telling you how good they were, but, you know what? They were hard to use! We'll admit it now because the stuff we have now is really easy to use. This time we're not kidding. These new products are a huge risk for us. We're betting the farm. Yes, the P in PTC stands for parametric, but never mind that for now*. Yeah we made Pro/E practically a household name, but watch as we do it all over again. Parametrics, history and history free/direct/explicit... whatever you call it, we can do it. Do it your way (somebody see if that's available). Sure, we used to sell you big monolithic, expensive apps and convinced you that was the only way to do serious CAD but now we're going to show you a slew of little, light apps -- and sell them online. Right, just like Apple...thanks for seeing that.

PTC could easily have coasted on their old product line. It was doing well enough. It was robust, a leader in many industries. No one ever faulted Pro/E on technology. A lot of big manufacturers used it (25,000 by PTC's count). Why change? Think Tiger Woods changing his golf swing when he was on top of his game.

In so many ways it makes no sense. PTC did shake up the CAD world over 20 years ago when it first appeared on the scene with a parametric/history based solid modeler. But in recent time, direct modeling has appeared as the new golden child. Industry stalwarts downplayed the technology, some still do. When PTC bought the direct modeling CoCreate, CAD insiders were convinced PTC was just hedging its bet. CoCreate was going to exist as a parallel offering, allowing PTC to give an either/or solution. Probably many saw CoCreate fading away as PTC concentrated on its main product line, using CoCreate only as an appeasement when the lack of direct modeling was seen as a deal breaker, like the lone veggie meal at a steakhouse. We thought they were just waiting till we lost interest in direct modeling. When the fad faded, everyone would come back to real CAD.

Not in my wildest dreams would I have thought PTC would scuttle their product line as they have done.

I can only speculate how this might have occurred. I can't imagine the old guard at PTC doing a shakeup of this magnitude but then I never really got PTC, a company that seemed to be bent on spending all its money acquiring companies that had only marginal utility for their users (Mathcad and Arbortext) in a quixotic attempt at growing market share.

I'm watching Jim Heppelmann on stage. Heppelmann officially took over PTC as CEO only back in October. Could Creo be his baby? I had him pegged as a PDM guy, with roots in Windchill. But in the official PTC bio, Heppelmann gets credit for Wildfire, which was big news when it revamped the venerable Pro/E interface. Could that have been a warm up for Creo? Still, Hepplemenn is gracious enough to share the stage with his lieutenants, Mike Campbell and Brian Shepherd, both of whom flawlessly deliver an explanation of Creo -- thankfully void of any more theatrical hijinks.

The PTC I knew would have conservatively kept the old product line intact and on the shelf, selling both. This PTC is different. Everyone must migrate to Creo.

Good thing PTC didn't go for the the burning bridges metaphor in the packed theater.

____
*Why doesn't PTC change their name from Parametric Technology Company to Product Technology Company already?  

 

PTC Frustrates Out of the Box

The Pro/E "out-of-the-box" experience has got me in a bad mood.

I had never installed Pro/E before. I had been warned that it "takes forever" which had already made me a tad anxious. But a customer sent me a PRT file and I had no choice. I pulled the Wildfire 3.0 box off the shelf and in 5 minutes, came to a screeching halt.

A brief chronology that should serve as a cautionary tale to anyone intent on creating a good out-of-the-box experience:

1. I put in the first CD, but it doesn't do anything. Oh, there's several disks here. I had put in disk 2. What's wrong with a DVD, I wonder?
2. I put in disk 1. Oh oh. The seal is broken. I may have tried this unsuccessfully before.
3. I click past the long winded EULA. I'm jaded and no longer read that, so still only mildly annoyed.
4. I am told there is no FLEXnet license. What the hell is that? I look for a code on the box. Nothing. On the CD envelope. No luck. Maybe it was silly to expect Pro/E install to act like every other installation.
5. I continue but the next screen wants a license serve and host name. Now I'm flipping through the (too thick) installation guide which tells me I should have received or can recieve (I'm not clear on this) a License Pack by email. If I ever did get one, it was hundreds of thousands of emails ago. I have hope of finding that.
6. I go to the URL as recommended by the installation guide, www.ptc.com/olm which initially gives me an error message but after playing with variations of the URL, I get it to say I am not authorized. Maybe, because on this computer, I am not recognized as being part of PTC's club.
7. - I log into PTC.com. It takes me a couple of tries to get it right, because I think it was years ago I had registered. But I must have registered for a press event or for a download (I can't remember), apparently not the right credentials for help with the license so IT STILL WON"T GIVE ME A LICENSE!
8. I look for a phone number. Like most big companies, the phone support is hidden under several layers of web pages. No, I don't want FAQs, or a damn knowledge search,  I don't want to send an email inot a black hole, just a human who I can plead with to let me start using the application.
9. I find a toll free number for tech support in the US and call. I get a voice menu even though the literature gives a firect number for licensing. A recorded message tells me the offices are closed. No time opening time is given (it's Friday night at PTC headquarters). Would I care to leave a message.
10.  stare at the screen entitled "World Wide Support." Ironic, for PTC now seems neither world wide or supportive.

No Surprise--PTC Up For Sale

PTC putting itself up for sale was no great surprise after it was revealed a few months ago how several PTC executive would net a personal fortune if such a sale were to occur.

On June 27, the Boston Business Journal reported on the "change of control bonuses" of  PTC executives. The leading beneficiary would be CEO C. Richard Harrison, who stands to get a whopping $15.5 million should PTC get acquired. After that, there is a huge drop to #2, with Jim Hepplemann getting only (!) $1.3 million. EVP's Barry Cohen and Paul Cunningham and CFO Cornelius Moses would get a shade over $1 million each.

I'm guessing that most CEOs given a choice between running an company and making a salary year after year and getting it all in one big lump sum by selling it, would choose the former.

It's easy to see how top executives benefit by adding "change of control bonuses." On top of that, they might even be able to negotiate to kep their jobs with the buyer. Also standing to benefit would be the stockholders -- at least in the short term -- if stock prices jump up (as they did already today) on news of the sale. But what of the users of PTC software? Can they help but feel abandoned?

And already, I can see the competitions sales teams licking their lips. Predators will exploit any weakness. This is a fat zebra with a broken leg.

CAD Programs Are So NOT the Same

oLONG BEACH, CA (PTC World Event) -- As I wasted way too much time online shopping for my own Father's Day gift, a GPS unit (hey, kids need help!) it occurs to me I should just walk into a store and pick one out. It may not be the perfect one, maybe I'd pay a bit more, but this should not be a big decision. Aren't they all pretty much the same?

It's not like picking out a CAD program, right?

Wrong. CAD programs are pretty much the same. That message came from a most unlikely source: the recent PTC press event. As you can see below, Pro/E, CATIA, UGNX, SolidWorks, Solid Edge -- even Inventor-- occupy the same horizontal space, which I am interpreting as robustness or capability. PTC meant to show that the brass ring goes to the company with the better data management solution (their Windchill product) but I'm floored by an implication of parity from a company in a competitive market -- especially a company whose long-standing insistence on product superiority has bordered on arrogance.

PTC suggests parity in MCAD programs (click for larger impage)

I mentally play back the tapes of previous presentations....and sure enough, a common thread emerges. CAD executives have been deemphasizing new features and capabilities, like they've been running out of stuff to add, running out of ideas, reluctant to compete feature by feature. Even my own readers have suggested that reviews and comparisons are pointless. I had attributed this attitude to fatalism and weariness. Few readers actually get to pick a CAD program as it is usually thrust upon them. Also, reviews have suffered from grade inflation in the hands of non-critical, vendor-friendly reviewers. Oh, don't get me started. But more on topic, I may have been closing my eyes to a creeping parity. Maybe they are all the same?

No, I refuse to give in. CAD programs are complex, nuanced, problematic. They have strengths and weaknesses.

So I still beg for a show down and shoot outs, a white knight of a publisher with guts and brains. How about pitching Pro/E against SolidWorks, as both claim to have solved filleting problems (yeah, right!). I ache for someone to put interoperability claims to the test, as one CAD vendor after another claims to work in multi-CAD "ecosystem."' (Or could they just stop saying "ecosystem" when they just mean  system?). They can't all be the same. If we can find  split hairs on GPS units, digital cameras, washing machines, why can't we be critical of CAD programs? I can find a half dozen good sites to compare the latest cell phone, something I will spend $50 on and have for a year, maybe less. Yet, no similar site exists for CAD programs.

Not long ago, I sat in embarrassed silence in an group of engineers as we were asked if anyone had analyzed the presidential candidates. Nobody had. And we're the kind of people who make spreadsheets to determine which screw to use.

Could there be such a thing as:

Roopinder's Law: The amount of analysis is inversely proportional to the importance of the decision.

Rounding is the Devil in the Details

Those little bitty fillets (AKA rounds, blends) so common on castings and molded parts can be ever so confounding to the conscientious designer trying ever so hard to complete the solid model. During the customer presentations at the PTC Wildfire Launch, one customer estimated 20-30% of their modeling time goes into creating -- or trying to create -- those devilish details. Multiply that across the sizeable Pro/E user base and you may get an idea of how just how welcome a magic wand would be. PTC says that magic wand will take the form of Auto Round (TM). If it is as good as is claimed, I have no doubt that Auto Round will be the single most popular enhancement  for Pro/E user in Wildfire 4.0.

According to PTC, the following part, which would be practically impossible to round for a beginner, would take an intermediate user an hour and a half to fillet. Put into the hands of an expert, it would still take 20 minutes to get the last pesky round in place. PTC says Auto Round will do it in 40 seconds.

Cynics will point out that the part could have been carefully selected  for success. But how would Auto Round work in the real world?

Callaway (the company known for the most brutishly powerful custom Corvettes) claims a 35-40% reduction in rounding time in the design of  the manifold shown below, and 60-70% reduction in another using the Auto Round feature. It may not solve every filleting problem, but even when it doesn't work, Auto Round will offer useful suggestions in how to proceed.

CAD insiders will no doubt compare this to SolidWorks attempts to solve complex filleting problems using their trademarked SWIFT, introduced about a year ago. Both companies appear to alleviate complex rounding problems for their users.

Now what we need is a head to head comparison!

PTC Embraces CoCreate

Despite it's billing as a Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire 4.0 Launch, most of the buzz at the annual PTC press event was about CoCreate. PTC had acquired CoCreate late last year. Media types and analysts came loaded with questions and PTC executives were only too happy to discuss the acquisition, like parents of a new baby.

"There are 2 types of modelers and we are inventors of both of them," said a proud Jim Heppleman, Executive VP of PTC.

Scene outside PTC HQ outside Boston, Massachusetts

As most CAD insiders know, PTC made its fame and fortune with parametric feature based modeling, whereas CoCreate throughout its long existence has championed plain old solid modeling -- no parametrics, no history tree. They had been calling this "dynamic modeling" modeling (which PTC is now calling "explicit" modeling). While PTC has been the more successful financially, each type has had its ardent supporters. Lately, dynamic modeling (by whatever name) has generated quite a bit of coverage by the trade press, much of it due to a concerted lobbying effort by Kubotek and SpaceClaim.

Despite its roots and because of the CoCreate acquisition, PTC is embracing "explicit" modeling so hard I'm afraid they may soon be changing their name from Parametric Technology Corporation. Hmm, maybe Product Technology Corporation would not be a bad idea. They could at least keep all their monogrammed towels, logos and stationery.

Last year, a product like CoCreate may have been derided for lacking "design intent" or being just too simple to handle real world design. But if you think that a sudden about face and selling a product based on a concept previously dismissed might be a bit awkward, you haven't experienced the amnesia companies develop to deal with inconvenient past claims. In fact, in calling CoCreate easy to use and boon to small firms, PTC came very close to admitting their flagship product, Pro/ENGINEER, was hard to use. "What could be simpler than a CAD products that has no parametrics?," asked PTC at one point.

PTC was not fraid to sling some mud at others, with SpaceClaim taking the worst shot. "Let them cut their price 6 more times trying to get their first customer," said Heppleman.

PTC confirmed that there is no plan to merge products after the acquisition, though certain technologies will appear across product lines. However, the OneSpace name will fade away.

All present resisted the urge to propose renaming CoCreate as Pro/CREATE [credit Mathew Palicki on Ralph Grabowski's blog.].

PTC - Process Design Corporation?

PTC hopes that its study of process will help its CAD customers -- and lead them to buy its non-CAD products

The "P" in PTC stands for "parametric" For now. But after 2 days of presentations (at the recently held press event in Tampa) I heard "process" a thousand times and "parametric" not once, I figure it's a matter of time before PTC changes its name to Process Design Corporation.

In the Beginning...

Parametrics, of course, is how PTC got famous. In the mid 1980s, it introduced Pro/ENGINEER, a parametric, feature-based solid modeler that revolutionized  mechanical design. However, these days the parametric label seems too confining. Selling individual design productivity is so last year. The company has decided that in order to grow, it must transcend the confines of engineering and manufacturing divisions, places where the CAD, CAM and CAE game has already been played out.

Growth Through Acquisition

Through acquisition (ten in the last three years), PTC has grown its range of products far beyond its original reason for existence. Many of the acquisitions have added products outside of its core of design, engineering and manufacturing software. For example, the Arbortext acquisition in 2005 gave PTC technical publication software. ITEDO, purchased last year, strengthened its tech pubs offerings. Mathsoft diversified PTC's portfolio even further. PTC also bought Numeta and Aptavis, whoever they are. The list goes on.

Currently, no other major CAD company has as diversified portfolio of products as PTC.

It's All About the Process

How does it propose to sell all these products to customers that may only know about PTC's core products? You guessed it: Process.

You see, mechanical design is just one part of the Process that big manufacturing companies need to be successful. There is calculation, electronic design, data management, technical publication, and so on. And wouldn't you know it, PTC happens to have a product for each part of the Process.

PTC has spent considerable effort to make itself an expert on Process. I was introduced to PTC's Process Road Map at a trade show about 2 years ago. It is a big poster with very small print and lots of boxes and arrows. I had hardly enough time to digest it but it looked like it painstakingly mapped out in the most minute detail how a company should operate. The Process Road Map is close to the company's heart -- literally. One executive carries it folded up in his suit jacket.

During the press event, PTC banged away at the Process drum. We were read the dictionary definition of process--in case we had missed that vital day in elementary school. We were told that no less of an expert than the late W. Edwards Deming had declared "if you can't describe what you are doing as a process, you don't know what you are doing." Yikes.

PTC is betting that once it has sold the chef the knives, he'll buy your skillet, your silverware, and maybe even your stove.

Results?

So how's that been working out? After a few years of acquiring diversified products, I was hoping that PTC would reveal how many many existing CAD customers had purchased ancillary products such as Arbortext or Mathcad. There was nothing about that in the presentations so I asked. PTC declined to answer, saying the company does not release that information but that "products are performing above expectations."

Michael Hawley Tells PTC Users of a Better Light Bulb

"Have you been replacing all your light bulbs with those things that look like melting Dairy Queen ice cream?" asks Michael Hawley. "Well stop, it!" Hawley was a keynote speaker at the recently held Pro/ENGINEER users meeting in Tampa He is founder of Friendly Planet, and more*.  Those light  bulb replacements contain mercury. Not very ecological at all, he says. Besides, you're just adapting Thomas Edison's archaic invention. What is the answer? LEDs, he says. They may not be commercially available now, but buy stock in LED companies. They're riding Moore's Law. Did you know 1/4 of our countries energy is spent on lighting?

As Michael Hawley is a MIT professor, I guess I ought to take him seriously.

Some other highlights of his talk.

• Switzerland is a depressing place. Every problem has been solved. If you blow your nose, there will be a trash can within 5 feet. It has a high rate of suicide.
• "When you are finished changing, you're finished," Ben Franklin
• "If you are going through hell, keep going," Winston Churchill
• "The future may require not so much having a new idea as stopping with old ideas," Edwin Land (inventor of the Polaroid camera).
• Marketing is what you do when your product sucks
• Last year there were more people in cities than in rural areas.
• Bhutan measures Gross National Happiness and has made smoking illegal. His picture book on Bhutan measures 5 ft by 7 ft and is the largest book sold by Amazon.

*More information on Michael Hawley on his home page at http://web.media.mit.edu/~mike/

Pro/ENGINEER Experts Answer User Questions

TAMPA BAY, Florida (PTC/USER) June 6, 2007 - Didn't get to go to the annual Pro/ENGINEER user meeting? You are not alone -- over 99% of users don't attend the giant user meetings and conferences most CAD vendors host every year. A pity, considering the incredible education a user would receive at such conferences, which are usally brimming with dozens of experts and can have hundreds of courses.

(click to see larger picture)

On the last day of PTC/USER recently concluded in Tampa, Mike Campbell, PTC's VP of Product Management (3rd from left above) allowed himself and his team of experts to be grilled by the Pro/E users in attendance. I've recorded the Q&A in the hopes that questions that may have been on your mind were also on minds of the attendees.

By the way, Wildfire 4.0 is expected in January 2008 and Wildfire 5.0 is already in development. "We have given our list to Santa and he will see how good we have been," says Mike. "All told, we have defined 85 'capability packages.' The product definition team will tell us how much it will cost. There's 3 rounds of this."

First, a couple of disclaimers. I'm not a stenographer so the following account of the Q&A is as good as my typing and memory allow. My apologies in advance to those whose words I botch. Also, although the panel may give its best answer based on present information, they cannot guarantee what will actually appear in a specific release.

When can I expect right click customization for my mouse?
Wildfire 5.0 will have better customization. It may have right mouse functionality. The main problem is making the right mouse menu context sensitive.

My top level model has 150 assemblies but it crashes all the time. What's the best way to assemble a top level model?
You have a 32-bit system, right? That's why it is crashing. XP has a switch to allow it to access 3GB if RAM. I've already done that. So, you must take better advantage of Pro/E’s Assembly Management tools, or move to 64-bit system

I'm from a small company. Is there a way to improve our tech support?
You should discuss this with the service people. We are just product people.

When will user interface for manufacturing products be similar to Wildfire?
80% of the manufacturing applications should be "Wildfire-ized" by the next release.

Will Wildfire support multiple processors?
We have been taking advantage of multiple processors since the 2000i Release. Every release we move more and more of Pro/E’s capabilities to take advantage of multiple processors.  In Wildfire 4.0, there has been another 3-5% improvement in regeneration, due to multi-threading -- not as much as we had hoped. But if you are considering a multi-core machine, we encourage you to choose one, as you will see a benefit just in the speed it will handle multiple applications running at one time.

What is the cost of Pro/TOOLMAKER? [formerly known as NC Graphics, recently acquired by PTC]
That has not been decided yet. Market research is being done. I expect it will be around $10,000.

If I am already a Pro/E Manufacturing customer. Will I be charged for this new application?
[some hesitancy] Not the full price... We are considering a time limited offer for Pro/NC customers.

What exactly will you be gaining with Pro/TOOLMAKER?
Faster removal of large volumes of material, toolpaths optimized for high-speed machining, web based tutorials, library of tools...

The ribbon cable design is pretty exciting. Can you handle flex circuits?
There will be increased capability for that in Wildfire 5

We make plates with 300 holes. It would be natural for the holes to be included in table. When can i expect this?
Wildfire 3 should allow all types of holes to be automatically inserted into a table. Stick around and we'll look at your case

When is PTC going have software for administrators?
We have a usage tracking utility which analyzes trail files and helps identify frequently used and little used commands. We use it internally. We're thinking of putting an interface on it and making this available to users. But currently there is no boxed solution.

Interoperability with CATIA: can Wildfire 3 read R16 and save to a newer version?
Wildfire 3 can export CATIA R10-R16 and recently introduced R17 support (unofficially). We have thought about adding a tag to identify the version of data but the data is usually upwardy compatible. Build M090 build officially supports R16.

Is there a way to save the part layer status in the context of an assembly without saving [modifying] the parts?
Yes, this capability is new in Pro/E Wildfire 4.0.

How long before the Mechanica postprocessor can interact with with Mathcad or Excel?
Wildfire 3 and Wildfire 4 can handle loads as Mathcad variables. Larger data set handling is under consideration.

Going back to the multi-CPU question, when will PTC take better advantage of multiple cores for Pro/E, specifically for assembly regeneration?
I share your frustration. We are continuing to research greater utilization of multiple CPUs, and certainly recognize that assembly regeneration is an area that you would like to see impacted.  We will keep the pressure on development to show improvement here. We want Pro/ENGINEER to be to be waiting for you, but we know you are waiting for it. However, we do consider ourselves to be a leader in this [large assembly] category.

What is the compatibility roadmap for PDMLink and Wildfire 4?
Because Windchill 9.0 will be released before Pro/E Wildfire 4.0, there will be no compatibility between Windchill 9.0 and Wildfire 4.0 at Wildfire 4.0 FCS [first customer ship]. However, Windchill 9.1, to be released in early 2008 will fix that. Pro/INTRALINK is at its end of life, so there will be no support for that with Wildfire 4.0.

A lot of companies have invested in family tables. Why is PTC killing them?
We are not killing family tables. In fact, there are lot of improvements in both Wildfire 3.0 and 4.0. We recognize these are very useful tools in Pro/E, but we could do a better job of managing them with our Data Management solutions.

I have to bring in models into SolidWorks so I can use them in Pro/ENGINEER. Can interoperability be improved?
I am surprised by the question. [list of interoperability enhancements named]. It must be a particular data set that is giving you problems. I'll speak with you afterward.

We want to be able to calculate paintable surface areas (which does not include mating area but does include exposed surfaces, edges, exposed parts of welds...) Will Pro/E be able to do that?
Yes, you can use Shrinkwrap technology to collect all of the external surfaces, and the Pro/E’s Bulk Items can be used to compute necessary volumes of paint required.

PTC announced a partnership with Autodesk? What are the results of that?
We announced a interoperability agreement with Autodesk, we are proponents of openness. We've had a longstanding relationship with UGS. The Autodesk agreement will give us better access to AutoCAD and to Inventor. We are pursuing a interface for those products.