Autodesk Cloud and “Business as Usual” Question

October 6, 2011

Cloud is a hot topic these days. No, I’m not going to talk about True vs. False cloud and Mark Benioff appearance on Oracle Open World. I want talk about another place where "the cloud" world can become a potential game changer – Autodesk. Two weeks ago Autodesk announced theirexpanded cloud services plan. By doing that, Autodesk put a very bold statement behind the future of CAD and design tools on the cloud.

Cloud and Engineering Software

People having different opinions about what Autodesk cloud means for users. I can summarize them in three separate trends – 1/ cloud change the way we design stuff; 2/ it is all about licensing; 3/ don’t worry, the "business as usual" anyway.

Navigate your browser to Josh Mings’ SolidSmack post How Autodesk plan to consolidate CAD (and you) on the cloud?Josh is clearly Gen-Y representative in my eyes. His view on cloud is as a logical next step in the evolution of computer systems. I like how Josh offsets the conversation from "accessing data" to "access the capability for design". I think, this is the key – data is important, but data is just a facilitator. The real goal is to change the way people can use design tools. This is my favorite passage from SolidSmack blog:

The worst Autodesk or any software developer can do is think it’s all about accessing data anywhere. The best they can do is think about allowing people to design more freely. Sound the same? Well, it’s not. Access is nice, but being able to decide where and how to access data, programs, settings is more important. ‘Access’ can easily be limited by thinking that web-based software makes it more accessible. This goes beyond bandwidth, always on, or offsite computing power. It’s ultimately about the choice that the user has and how he’s able to use your software.

Another post that caught my attention was Dezignstuff by Matt Lombard. Navigate to Autodesk heads to the cloud post. Matt quoting Brad Holtz in the beginning by stating – "it is all about getting users to maintenance". The point Matt is trying to make in his blog is related to the fact companies will try to use cloud to ask customers to pay more and more for software and bug fixing. I recommend you to read a long list of comments to this blog article as a good reference about what people think with regards to licensing and cloud.

The last post I want to mention is Autodesk Cloud- don’t panic, business as usual by Steve Johnson of cadnauseam. As I can read Steve, he sees the cloud as something that happens on "another planet". From his standpoint the cloud products are peripherals, Autodesk is trying "cloud water" to understand how to make money there. At the same time, core products from Autodesk remain unchanged. So, all it means -"business as usual". Here is the quote from his post:

Like the vast majority of Autodesk customers, I will just carry on using conventional software in that old-fashioned 20th century way that just happens to work very well. Autodesk will go on providing its software in that way, because that’s what most customers will want for at least a while yet, and Autodesk can’t survive on wisps of Cloudy revenue. Move along, people, nothing to see here.

Autodesk Cloud: Learning from SolidWorks Mistakes?

You cannot think about what Autodesk is doing without checking out SolidWorks. As you can read, lots of comments about Autodesk cloud are crossed with remarks about SolidWorks cloud announcement almost two years ago on SWW 2010. Was it the cloud false start for SolidWorks? SolidWorks provided mixed messages about cloud the cloud. It is true that DS SolidWorks came lately with n!Fuze product as part of overall Dassault V6 cloud appearance. To see it in balance, we need to wait and watch Autodesk AU 2011 announcements as well as coming SolidWorks World 2012.

What is my conclusion? As Mark Benioff said yesterday – "You cannot stop the cloud. The cloud must go on". The power of cloud solutions cannot be diminished these days. What will be the right pathway for CAD companies to the cloud? This is the question Autodesk, SolidWorks and other companies need to answer. We are going to discover very soon. Just my thoughts.

Best, Oleg

image scottchan / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

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PLM and Social Enterprise: Files vs. People?

September 8, 2011

For the last couple of days, I’m digesting materials from the Dreamforce conference organized by Saleforce.com. I wasn’t able to make it this year, but the stream of online information and social networks clearly stated that this even last week in San-Francisco was felt almost like Oracle Open World, which is actually going to happen at the same place in one month.

Marc Benioff’s Social Enterprise

Salesforce.com CEO is pushing towards something he called “Social Enterprise”. I have to say, the term is still needed to be analyzed, and it sounds very “marketing” to me. However, in the explanations, Benioff defines social enterprise in three steps for every company:

1. Make full use of public social networking tools like Facebook and Twitter.
2. Create private social networks inside of organizations and among partners.
3. Developing social networking capabilities for enterprise applications.

In the following video Marc Benioff explains these three steps early this year during the Cloudforce event in Boston:

How PLM can get social?

In my view, “social” trends are clearly recognized in the PLM space. CAD and PLM vendors started to push some social buzzwords as well make some initial experiments. I can include few tools and announcements made by PLM vendors – Windchill Social Link, Dassault 3DSwYm, SAP StreamWork and few others. This list is not exhaustive. In addition to that, PLM vendors and service provide worked to provide socially oriented solutions based on usage of tools like SharePoint and some others.

Social PLM: Files vs. People

Social experiments of PLM vendors and huge Benioff Social Enterprise concepts made me think about some elements of PLM that actually can fit into the 3 steps roadmap proposed by a charismatic salesforce.com leader. The focus of PLM software is clearly on the step 3 and related how existing tools used by people in manufacturing company can be connected to social networking infrastructure.

PLM tools are doing a lot in collaboration. However, the topic of PLM collaboration for most of the cases is around so called “files” or associated “file data”. The multiple collaborative applications are focusing on how people can access data simultaneously or in an asynchronous way. Here is the main difference. Social enterprise is focusing on people as a major players in social interaction. Files and other data need to be at people disposal in order to communicate efficiently.

What is my conclusion? It is still hard to make a prediction about future Social Enterprise development. What is clear to me is that PLM and other systems involved into the overall enterprise social interaction have to find a right way to communicate and expose information to people. Similar to Facebook’s ability to to share files, new generation of CAD, PDM and PLM tools need to build this connection to accomplish the final step in Social Enterprise strategy. Do you think PLM vendors will play Social Enterprise game? A good question. Do you think salesforce.com will become an ultimate social platform? Btw, Salesforce just acquired web domain social.com for $2.6M. Big plans ahead… Just my thoughts.

Best, Oleg

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How PLM Can Catch Up Cloud 2?

July 2, 2010

I have been discussing Cloud-related topics on PLM Think Tank actively since last year. I think, the term is hugely overloaded, I can see horizons where cloud becomes a kind of reality for engineering and manufacturing software. This is still not much real, up and running solutions. However, there is a constant stream of attention, awareness and trials that is coming from multiple providers in CAD/PLM space.

So, Cloud is coming and this is a perfect time to talk about… Cloud 2. It sounds crazy… huh? No, I don’t think so. On September 23, Salesforce.com released Salesforce.com Chatter. Mark Benioff and the team presented his vision of Cloud 2 on their conference couple of a month ago. I had chance to get some materials and videos about that reviewed during this week. It made me to think about some interesting behaviors and characteristics Salesforce’s Cloud 2 definition in the context of Product Lifecycle Management.

If you have time, take yourself on the following two videos, otherwise, proceed to my takeaways below.

Cloud 2: Takeaways

There is a huge shift happens in how we are using devices. The massive increase in notebook and mobility created a structural shift in how people are starting to use the internet. This is going to impact the environment in the offices and other professional zones.

Cost, ease of use, infrastructure, content creation, services are in the past of Cloud 1. The fundamental shift is going towards to the collaborative environment of the future – new devices, real time, social environment.

Thank you Amazon, welcome Facebook! This is another major shift in application behavior. It is worth reading some of Benioff’s posts about Facebook’s imperative.

Here are some of my Cloud-2 thinking about how it impacts PLM.

Organization Is Flat and Real-Timed
This is a major organizational shift that PLM needs to learn. Fewer processes, fewer hierarchies, fewer predefined events. More flexibility, ad-hoc, connections and real-time updates.

Product Data with no boundaries
Data need to be available to be able to collaborate on top of all ad-hoc processes. You cannot lock it down to formats, applications, departments. Company’s strategies on data lock-in and data protection are going to die under the pressure of customers to be able to collaborate and share.

Context, Context, Context…
The next king on the road is a context. To be able to work, contextually and having all what you need for decision making, becomes a key. It will be very interesting to see how to bring a new contextual formula to engineers in the organization.

What is my conclusion today? Cloud 2 is coming. Regardless on our agreement and disagreement on names, we are going to see a significant shift in the way application will be delivered and used in the social environment. The question is not how to develop social applications. The right question is how to help people to live in a new environment and achieve their operational goals?  Just my thoughts…

Best, Oleg

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