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Congratulations!
You created a great product!
I hope that this will get you even better and won't hold you back or change your approach to cad modeling and interface, and I hope you made LOADS of cash and that all of you are extremely happy!
You deserve it.
First off, I hope things work out good. I very much enjoy using Onshape. I think it’s a brilliant program. My being able to do what I do with this program, on an iPhone — well, I think it’s just amazing. There is nobody else doing this.
Years ago, I did make money doing CAD, but that era is long gone. Now, I’m a hobbyist, and as such, I enjoy participating in this forum and making a GIF every now and then, if it will help somebody out. I hope they keep it free for us hobbyists.
I honestly think PTC got an amazing deal on the acquisition:
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2017/05/06/the-worlds-most-valuable-resource-is-no-longer-oil-but-data
Just hope they let the OG team continue to run things with a development and innovation focus
CAD Engineering Manager
I want to extend a personal thank you to those that believed in Jon Hirschtick's (et al) vision and risked the millions of dollars it took to make it a reality. Your faith in Jon has made a mark in the MCAD product world; now we will have to wait and see how much of the mark PTC's eraser business practices leave.
In my experience, every employee at Onshape is here because they genuinely believe Onshape is the best platform for product design. We are all still here and have the same focus.
I am very excited to see what the future holds.
It has been amazing watching Onshape grow, and you worked with us to give us a path to transfer to Onshape in a controlled manner - ultimately to being exclusively Onshape. Meeting yourself and @jon_hirschtick at Develop3D provided a huge amount of confidence that you are the right team to back.
I know that we are only a small customer for you guys, but you have never made us feel any less important than anyone else in your portfolio. Aside from the huge technical benefits that your cloud base provides, please don't underestimate how important your customer support and interaction has been to us.
I think you can contribute the lack of opinions from current employees for a couple of reasons:
1) The majority of us roughly found out about the acquisition at the same time as everyone else. I think, like you all here, it will take time to process what this means for us individual, what it means for our company, and what it means for the product.
2) I think we were unsure how our users were going to take the news and were genuinely curious how it would be perceived by everyone here. As a company, I feel we respect our users enough to allow all of you space to freely discuss your feelings of the acquisition here. By and large we don't try to control the narrative and try to give honest interactions as much as possible.
For me, I'm a firm believer that talk is cheap and that actions speak louder than words. For those with mixed feelings or trepidations of Onshape going forward, all I ask is that you give us a chance to prove your fears wrong. Likewise, hold our feet to the fire if our words are incongruent with our actions and we fail to meet our promise to you.
I've known about these proceedings for a bit, while never an active participant in the discussions or meetings. Jon pulled me aside one night to go over what was going on, why he thought it was a good path forward for the company, and to get my honest feedback. The one thing I made abundantly clear with Jon is that regardless of the discussions going on that we don't hold releases or deployments, we don't fast-track or disable functionality, and we don't put up special infrastructure because of demos or presentations that we have. If it is not good enough for us, then it is not good enough for our customers. If it is good enough for us, then it is good enough for our customers. While these demos might be more personally tangible to us, they are not more important than any other reasons people use Onshape. Jon agreed whole heartedly, but in a way he was a bit confused because he thought this was obvious.
During our announcement, I looked visibly anxious, dour, and upset. I had my head in my laptop and barely looked up to see who was saying what. It had nothing to do with the announcement and everything to do with what Lou posted in our what's new (https://forum.onshape.com/discussion/comment/57341/#Comment_57341). A functionality that I had signed off on, something that I had personally tested, was screwing over users. This was unacceptable to me and coming up with a solution was more important than whatever news we were going to hear. We had pushed out a change about 10 minutes before the announcement to tune down the effect of this functionality and then spent the entire announcement stressing over whether problems would crop up again.
I think it is easy to say customers come first, but I've seen enough examples with the way we operate to truly believe it is fact at Onshape. It's in our DNA and our management team is no different. It is because of this that I don't think Jon would make this deal if he thought it would compromise that. It's my belief in Jon and my coworkers who have gone through this process of getting a deal with PTC, and their honest feedback, why I also think this is a good thing for Onshape.
Main thing I (and probably others) are worried about is the fact that now there is also other people with their interests and policies to control how things will be done.
I know exact agreements are classified but if it's possible to slightly open how Onshape is secured to continue as it is - that would likely be the main question to answer.
I'm not gonna paint anymore dark clouds on the sky since I have some Onshaping to do and I enjoy more modeling with this software than worrying what could possibly go wrong.
For me it's all the same if they paint the logo pink and name it whatever PTC cloud creo - as long as you provide me the link to access, keep my plan&pricing as it is and stay awesome with the product and customer service. And spend some time with us here in forums.
Have a nice weekend everyone!
@shaun_singh has it exactly right above: "I know that we are only a small customer for you guys, but you have never made us feel any less important than anyone else in your portfolio. Aside from the huge technical benefits that your cloud base provides, please don't underestimate how important your customer support and interaction has been to us."
It is truly remarkable that I can submit an issue in a document, and literally within minutes, I can see @TimRice or @pete_yodis or @NeilCooke or @lougallo in there poking around and working the problem.
The technical benefits and fundamental approach of this SaaS platform, the incredible service (and community) from Onshape folks, and the relentless and refreshing update schedule are truly different than any other CAD (and most other software). CAD & CAD data management is central to many of our careers, businesses, and making, and Onshape makes it a pleasure.
Keep moving forward!
@jon_hirschtick mentioned in the release and OP, and other Onshape folks have reiterated since: there are some excellent new capabilities coming along from Onshape that are facilitated by this acquisition, and I can't wait.
You WILL be assimilated.
Twitter: @bradleysauln
The thing I'm most excited about is having more resources and support! We have so many great ideas and project in the pipeline, and I think this will really let us push new functionality out the door faster.
Sorry it took me a while to catch up with this thread, I've had my head down working on some //top-secret hole feature performance improvements//. The work never stops here!
The company I work for isn't that large and OS's subscription price right now is just about right. My hope is OS keeps its price competitive and as its features expand, as being hinted at, and doesn't balloon in cost. We have years of files and parts libraries in OS and I'd hate to, because of subscription costs, have my employer weigh going to another platform.
I say this as a daily OS user that's seen its growth and really like this program and would hate to see it change for the worse.
I'm also another cad user that came over from Alibre after it was acquired by 3ds. What a change that was. It was like going from driving a Chevett to a Lexus.
But I can only hope OS stays true to their values like they say. I don't really feel like eating crow right now.
As to the future we do have a vested interest as we bought into Creo a couple of years back. We continue to run SolidWorks as well (all on maintenance). Comparing Creo to SolidWorks is like comparing an apple to an orange. Creo is much faster, much more stable and for surfacing much more capable. SolidWorks is much more usable, easier to learn and (I think) a much more flexible modelling platform.
Ultimately this sale is a vindication of the vision that led to Onshape starting up. PTC sees a value where Dassault continue to push totally silly messages and cloud software that offers very little to their customer base. Well done and look Ford to seeing you at Develop3D Live in April. PRC are going to need a bigger stand 😁
Pricing (+ grand fathered plans): NO CHANGE
Free/Edu: NO CHANGE
Kernel (Parasolid): NO CHANGE
Commitment to customers: NO CHANGE
On Friday afternoons, we have a company meeting - it usually lasts an hour. Typically it includes the usual stuff - birthdays, which team is on kitchen duty the following week and demonstrations of things people are working on. This one was a bit different. We celebrated a founder (Scott Harris) being inducted into his alma mater Hall of Fame for contributions to humanity (nothing to do with Onshape), the winners of a chilli/soup competition from lunchtime were announced (much hilarity over an American Chop Suey recipe winning). Jon Hirschtick then took questions for a few minutes - nothing of note. And then for 45 minutes we analyzed and cheered and asked questions about demos of things we were all working hard on for 1.05 and beyond - the stuff that matters to CUSTOMERS.
After the meeting, some people went home for the weekend, but many stayed to incorporate feedback into their projects, or just catch up on work. I left sometime after 7pm on a Friday night and people were still working just like they always did the Friday before and the Friday before that.
Whatever you read in this thread, never doubt our commitment to the mission - if you think someone has a crystal ball, great - ask them for lottery numbers. If you want to know what we’re doing, please free to ask. And yes, Jake really is working on hole performance (he sucks at secrets)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1v0USh10jmg