On the Road from SolidWorks WORLD 2008

I had to go San Diego to see the future of engineering.

SolidWorks (SW) co-founder Jon Hirschtick invited me to join his company’s blog site and I was honored to accept his invitation. Jon handed over the CEO job several years ago to give himself more time to do strategic planning for SW. The truth of the matter is he is really a futurist for all things related to computer aids for engineering.

When I got off the plane Saturday I headed off to the Blog Squad dinner where I met my fellow bloggers. They are the not so silent evangelist for SW. They are not employees so they tell like it is. I don’t know of any other CAD company that proactively fosters this freedom of expression all accessible on the Internet. I am happy to call myself a member plus the food and drink was good!

The next day both Jon and relatively new CEO Jeff Ray gave a “special” talk to 160 members of the press. The Blog Squad was invited and in fact were acknowledged frequently by the speakers. Jeff spoke from heart, no PowerPoint! I like when people do that, it cuts down on canned spin. Jeff really got my attention when he admitted he was concerned about feature bloat. The good news is the developers at SW agree and have provided a solution in SolidWorks 2008. What is it? I will tell you tomorrow. I will also tell you about the love fest I had.

Stay tuned.