Welcome to the Onshape forum! Ask questions and join in the discussions about everything Onshape.
First time visiting? Here are some places to start:- Looking for a certain topic? Check out the categories filter or use Search (upper right).
- Need support? Ask a question to our Community Support category.
- Please submit support tickets for bugs but you can request improvements in the Product Feedback category.
- Be respectful, on topic and if you see a problem, Flag it.
If you would like to contact our Community Manager personally, feel free to send a private message or an email.
Comments
Question to the hobbyists: If you could do "design for hire" in Onshape (enough to cover the cost of a pro subscription) would you? In other words, what if Fastway Engineering prepaid your yearly subscription, but you then owed us X hours of design time that year. Would you sign a 1-year contract with us as a part time designer? This would allow you to continue to work on your hobby designs in private, but you would (theoretically) have less time to work on them. Discuss.
Linked[in]
I'll bite Jim, How many hours do you want?
_Ðave_
So far as contracts go, sure I'd consider it, but $1200 (for OS) doesn't buy many billable hours even at what I would consider a decent hourly rate. I operate a (very) small job shop and would have to double or triple this year's business to even consider a Pro plan as an acceptable expense.
I'm in a similar boat as Joe. I'm an engineering professional working with a startup company as a sideline. I'm working on a prototype for a new product for the company, but right now it's not our main product and it's too early to say if it's even a viable product. It's way too early to spend $100/month or more on it, especially as I have to shoehorn development time in with my primary employer and volunteer activities. I could envision OnShape being worthwhile some day in the future if the product takes off, or if we get another engineer on board and I want to collaborate with him/her, but now is not the time.
I suspect that OnShape is in a bind because they are not getting the anticipated sign-ups for the Professional plan. I have gotten two sales calls from them recently. I further suspect that they are hoping that the plan changes will entice some existing users to switch to the Professional plan. Maybe it will in a few cases, but I don't think many. As other commenters have pointed out, there are other options out there, and the all-or-nothing pricing structure means there is no easy path from hobbyist/tinkerer to semi-professional.
The recent plan change announcement erodes two key elements in my relationship with OnShape: trust and confidence. Humans are risk-averse. It really bothers us to lose something, even something we don't really own. So I'm not surprised to see words like "betrayal" being used in the comments. I too feel like they reneged on an implied deal. Typically a company rewards their early adopters. It's how you build a loyal core of users who will spread the word. By taking away the private documents with no grandfathering for existing private documents, it feels like OnShape is abandoning its early adopters. This announcement damages the trust that users have put into the company.
Judging from all the negative reactions to the change, and my suspicions about OnShape's current situation above, I can't say I have much confidence in OnShape's future. I think they have just did a lot of damage to their brand, and if they stick with this plan change, they may not be around a year from now. I hope that's not the case, as I have really liked the product, but I'm preparing myself for the worst.
@michael3424 - The company is as stable as the platform, you should go visit some time. Amazing people. So, what is a decent hourly rate? Let's talk numbers - It sounds like you have a $600 - $1200/year machine shop? What's the average job size? What would it take to get a few more jobs in there? A little advertising in your local community? Reaching out to larger shops for overflow work? Think bigger.
@mahir - How about a multi-year contract?
As if it's not obvious, those of us who are [pro] have figured out how to afford the $1200. I doubt we're a bunch of rich, retired hobbyists - we just engineered a solution. Maybe we make money directly off of Onshape, or maybe we don't, but either way, our customers are paying for our Onshape privacy. BTW, many of us figured out how to make money off of CAD (most likely on the side at first) long before Onshape came along.
In this day and age, if you are 100% self funding your hobby your doing it wrong. As Designers and Engineers, we are creative thinkers and problem solvers. Now apply that to business, and become a part of the gig economy already.
Linked[in]
This is where Jim's idea can help you.
Maybe Onshape could build portal for 'design-farm' where anyone could buy short (or long) term modeling service easily. Work would then be assigned to whomever is marked him/herself as available.. I'm amazed if something like this doesn't already exist but I'm not aware of such.
My "sales" are highly variable but have been much higher than $600/year for the past few years. My primary product is machine work and CAD is ancillary to that. My highest expenses are the machine tools and consumables and those expenses *always* have to be met or nothing gets sold since nothing can be machined. I currently have 3 legal options for CAD, one of which was Onshape, and the other two options are a perpetual license of GeoMagic Design and (as of a few days ago) a free license of F360. At present, I can easily do my CAD work with GMD so Onshape is not essential at all for me. CAD consumes perhaps 5-10% of the effort I expend for the sales I make. Consequently I need a lot of sales to justify the cost of CAD, probably $15-30k in the case of Pro Onshape. As a recent retiree my objective is to only make enough profit to pay for my hobbies and the last thing I want to do is grow a business to the point where it starts to dominate my life. Given all that I am not a good candidate for the Pro plan, though a middle tier at say $600/year might still make sense, especially when my hobby interests are considered.
It appears, though, that people like me are apparently not part of Onshape's target customer base. That's OK, but I do wish Onshape had made that clear from the start.
I have loved Onshape and have encouraged a lot of people to join up and really wanted it to turn into the best cad option out there.
I have been with Onshape since Beta a have loved how it has progressed so far. As for the CAD side of things I still think its the best, but as for the plans Onshape is really missing the boat.
I am a promoter of open source and have a lot of opensource designs released. But this doesn't mean that every open source designer wants everything to be public right from the start.
It also doesn't mean that Opensource designers want every design to be opensource.
Onshape recently went to Ultimakers UM3 release. Ultimaker is a Opensource 3D printer manufacture who is extremely successful AND they only release the design files that makes them opensource 6 months after the product release.
I have had countless annoying phone calls from a Onshape rep trying to get me to sign up to Onshape Pro and I tell him every time, I don't make money from my designs but if you provide a Maker plan at a lower cost then the pro with limited storage then I will be happy to sign up.
As for fusion 360, they have a low cost option that is affordable to Makers and the second biggest CAD market share ( according to cnc cookbook Fusion 360 14.6% while Onshape sitting at 3.9% ). Not only this but they also have integrated CAM. Why is Onshape refusing to tap into this maker market? I just don't get why Onshape does not consider a middle tier plan. So many people have been requesting this right from beta. Opensource market is a lot smaller then Makers in general and so many makers people are willing to pay.
I think this announcement will only increase Fusion 360 market share which will provide more shared content for makers and make an even more attractive package for new comers. I have read so many people out side of these forums who a making the switch which is a sad sight but I think its a good move and one I think I will also make.
HWM-Water Ltd
BTW, I see from another thread that OS can turn features on or off for selected groups of users. That was in the context of testing new features but two other thoughts occurred to me - 1) The infrastructure may already be in place to limit features for users in different classes and, 2) Programming to limit the number and size of private documents shouldn't be much of a problem.
One possible consequence of (1) is that OS might start charging extra fees for certain classes of features so Pro users might want to consider that possibility.
Also someone keeps voting down replies in this thread which seems a bit childish.
I have an entirely original VTOL aircraft project that I was hoping to design here and then build in the Philippines. Yes, in the Philippines, primarily to create employment in a country where it is really needed. Funds are extremely limited and there is no way I can afford to spend thousands on CAD to bring my vision to reality - it is the free platform that brought me here in the first place. A major portion of the build will need to be crowd or sponsor funded. It is really hard for the little guy to get something done, especially when one does not expect to make a profit. Maybe I need to look at FreeCAD.
I really like what you are doing here and hope it works out for you, but I think I better look at another tool - something that I have a little more control over.
After obviously using the free version as a tool to get free alpha/beta software debugging/review services out of their user base, OS closes the door on the legions of folks who helped get the product salable. Sad, but not surprising. The lessons learned in the commercial world of MCAD are difficult to cast aside. This has a faint aroma of some of the wonderful sales tactics that PTC used to employ back in the day.
Recently, I've done a review of the inexpensive/free MCAD systems out there and OS wasn't high on the list due to the commercial policies. It's now fallen off the list. For the price of admission of the Pro version, I can maintain my seat of SolidWorks which has SIGNIFICANTLY more features and capabilities.
I've cautiously recommended OS to others in the recent past with a caveat about the restrictions of the free version being storage limited. Henceforth when asked, I will recommend Fusion 360 and not mention OS.
I hope this works out for you guys, but I'm not optimistic.
OS really does need a middle tier and the free tier should have been left with at least 1 private document.
As a business, I'm certainly willing to pay to use a product that is so pivotal to creating income. Unfortunately, Onshape in its current shape is not worth the $1200 to us. It's currently too immature and "beta" feeling. It can do some of what I need (and do it really well), but I still have to use other programs to accomplish what I need. (For reference, with Solidworks, 95% of what I needed could be done). I suspect that other free users are in the same boat.
For the past year, I've been using and testing both Onshape and Fusion360. Both programs have their plusses and minuses. However, I've come to find that for every feature that Onshape releases ("tab search", "document tags", etc), Fusion360 releases entire categories ("Mesh Workspace", "Cloud Simulation", "Rendering", "CAM", etc). If I have $1200 set aside to pay for a product, my money is going to go towards the software the provides the most value, and also shows the most signs of including features that will one day be mature and valuable to me. Onshape does not do that yet. (there are countless threads about feature wish-lists, so I won't add to that here). Fusion360 is also not worth $1200 and is also missing features and can be very buggy - but at least they have a low tier payment plan that allows me to work and grow with the software and still use it for viable work. In addition, Fusion360 has a public roadmap -- so I know that any time and money I've invested will pay off as I am able to see future feature releases. I have no clue what Onshape will look like or what features they feel are important.
Someday, Onshape will hopefully be a fully mature product and worth the money to me. But by that time, I'll have already invested time and training into Fusion360 and won't want to change.
I paid $25 for last years subscription.
I have no problem paying $120 to extend for another two years.
If last year was $25 and now it is 100$ - that's 4x price.
So that could indicate similar route as Onshape but they are just increasing the price.
Is there any promise that price will stay below Onshape when they reach industrial standards in features and stability?
Another thought:
If there is anyone with the facts it would be interesting to estimate the numbers what new cad company needs to succeed:
Developers cost, 50x $5000 ? / month = 250 000 -> at least 3 million / year
Other costs, could be similar per person so
Total cost around 6 M$ / year, starting from day one.
After what 2-3 years there could be posibility to begin early beta testing, that requires more stuff in customer service, accounting, etc..
So cost when moving out of beta could be around 30 million dollars.
Cost per user is something and general expenses are growing a bit per user.
So how many users can there be?
I suppose investors expect to see zero result in couple years after launch and remarkable profit after few years to get their money back.
I don't have a clue of real numbers as I'm not even close to this business - but I know numbers are huge and it's real money they need to cover all of the costs - not matter if it's called Onshape or Fusion.. (I know Fusion is not company but only one product, it still needs to eventually make profit to stay alive)
I'd guess that F360 prices will go up over time as that is just the nature of things and it wouldn't surprise me if the free plan is eliminated or restricted at some point. Eventually those of us using F360 for free may also become disillusioned as pricing develops but for now it is an excellent deal and there seems at least the possibility for an affordable lower or middle tier. Onshape has nothing comparable to offer and, at least for now, have made it clear that they never intend to.
I suspect that your estimate for OS technical staff labor cost is pretty far below the actual cost. I worked in a technical field in an R&D function for many years here in the US and the burdened staff rate was something like $350k/year. OS may partially compensate some of their staff with stock options so their cost may be somewhat lower but it is almost certainly a lot more than $60k per year.
I'm slowly getting better in F360, but there is a learning curve coming from Onshape. Some stuff is better, some is worse, but the total amount of tools and features in F360 blows Onshape totally out of the water.
I still think Onshape is making a mistake with the new "forced share" plan, but by the time they (maybe) realize this, the users that wanted a middle tier plan will have left (and isn't likely to return), and the users on the new free plan will fill up Onshape servers with large amounts of garbage and half-finished stuff. Even if storage these days is cheap, it isn't free, so at some point I guess the Pro users will have to pay the price.
I'm finding the same as you you wrt learning curve but there are some good videos out there that help out, though I think Onshape's videos are generally better and OS seems a bit more consistent in the UI. The built-in CAM in F360 seems more than decent and that adds a lot of value for me. Interesting that neither OS nor F360 supports hole call outs in drawings yet. I also agree that public OS storage will be a cesspool of garbage after a bit of time and that Pro users will be subsidizing it.
I'd love to be a fly on the wall during OS strategy or investor meetings to see what is behind this change.
However, it might be that the number of subscriptions is still so low that the price of $1200 isn't enough to give a decent ROI. I gather that the price of pro will rise proportionally with investor impatience, so pro users probably need to brace themselves. This plan change may well be founded on a belief that current free users will need the privacy that only pro users have. Might be true for some, but I guess the majority of us "mid-tier"-guys jumps ship instead.
It's a shame OS can't change their minds about the recent changes. If OS had similar pricing structure to Fusion 360 normal pricing they could have had my money.
I guess I was not paying much attention to the emails. They all seemed to be for webinars that took place while I was at my day job. Probably very helpful, but I just deleted them. Likely did that to the BOMB too! I was kind of disappointed to hear at Thanksgiving from someone I got on board and excited about OS not too long ago that they were changing things. When I got home, I learned from these forums that it is true.
I am a full time utility worker who had an idea for an industry related invention. I have built working prototypes and found that for the next step I needed to have the product CAD modeled. Every one I talked to said I would be charged about $125 an hour. Seemed ridiculous to me. Then after a little internet search I stumbled across OS. Was like a dream come true! I invested in a new computer so I wouldn't have to do it all from my phone. Then I spent countless hours building my proficiency with the program since I was new to this CAD world. Now that I finally got my idea modeled to a point where it actually looks like the real prototype on my work bench, it appears I will only be able to view the files unless I upgrade or make it public. At this point I really do not want to do either. I can't!!! I can't afford the pro pricing and I do not wish to give away the farm!
Like others have said, a cheaper plan for those like me would be stellar. Not that we wouldn't want to pay more for a great product, but most of us do not have a company already established that can easily write these expenses off. We live paycheck to paycheck, and really appreciated the privacy of our potentially valuable documents. I could conceivably pay a few dollars a month but not $100+.
You have an awesome product. It is worth something. Make it available to people like me, and from what I read, there are many, who need an affordable price, and the privacy for unpateneted ideas. This is how we all win. We get what we need and you get more money! You pretty much ruined my Thanksgiving. So lets make this work so we can all have a good Christmas!
Regards,
Barry I. Blevins
I would also say that I appreciate the the free unrestricted (and now with unlimited storage) public use of Onshape.
_Ðave_
Back in May 2015 when OnShape changed the terms for hobby users, I had an exchange with an OnShape rep who was soliciting input. I told him that the drastic change in terms for hobby users made me feel betrayed and that I had no confidence that they wouldn't change the terms again in the future. I summed it up with a Darth Vader quote "I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further". Well, looks like they did alter it further.
Back in May, because of my lost confidence and reluctance to invest more time learning software that I couldn't trust to be there, I mostly moved on to a more stable competitor's product and stopped talking up OnShape to colleagues.
I checked in today because I have noticed OnShape employees stalking me on LinkedIn and had a missed call from OnShape today, so I was curious as to why sales guys were circling.