Autodesk practices moderation in marketing
By Sidney Hill, Jr., executive editor -- Manufacturing Business Technology, 9/1/2006 12:00:00 AM
The marketing of enterprise software often is portrayed as an evil endeavor, with "hype" being the term most frequently used to describe vendors' efforts to promote their products.
My dictionary defines hype—short for hyperbole—as excessive or exaggerated promotion bordering on deception or fraud. While many users believe software vendors routinely engage in excessive promotion, it would be an exaggeration to suggest that vendors are guilty of deception or fraud.
Much of the acrimony surrounding the marketing of software stems from the days—not so long ago—when automating business processes was a new idea. Expectations on both sides—the vendor and the customer—probably were too high, as companies signed on to install large, expensive systems designed to manage multiple functions. When projects like this stalled, the vendor was blamed for "hyping" the product.
These days, however, both the expectations and the rhetoric about what software can do are more realistic. This change in thinking was evident at a recent meeting—called a Manufacturing Solutions Summit—in which Autodesk sought to update the trade press on its strategies for selling its software to manufacturing companies.
Engineers use Autodesk's highest-profile products—AutoCAD and Inventor—to generate new product designs. Autodesk also has products with names like Vault and Productstream that can be classified as product life-cycle management (PLM) applications. But in the spirit of not wanting to practice excessive or exaggerated promotion, Autodesk has become careful in its product marketing.
"We're not going to get caught up in the whole enterprise PLM vortex" is how Bob Merlo, VP of manufacturing solutions, explained Autodesk's current marketing strategy. When asked what that meant, Merlo said Autodesk offers solutions for engineers to create product designs and move those designs to manufacturing. It does not help with gathering market research or product requirements before the design phase begins, nor does it offer solutions to support field service.
Merlo conceded that some people might consider Vault and Productstream PLM applications, but said Autodesk prefers to call them data-management solutions. He also stressed that they are used primarily for managing engineering data in relatively small workgroups.
"Eighty percent of our customers have less than 10 seats of CAD [software]," Merlo said. "They don't need enterprise PLM."
He wouldn't say it, but I sensed Merlo really meant Autodesk's customers don't need the large, risky implementations that traditionally have been associated with enterprise PLM.
While I applaud Autodesk's efforts at moderation in marketing, it shouldn't forget that even the small and medium-size companies it targets want to do things that could be considered enterprise PLM. Autodesk customers at the summit said as much.
Don Gradin, mechanical designer with KONE, said the elevator and escalator manufacturer recently adopted the Inventor 3D design program to improve its ability to create components that can be used across product lines. But KONE also wants to incorporate 3D models into sales brochures and instructional videos for installing and repairing its products. And as a global company, said Gradin, "We want to break the language barrier with descriptive animation for training purposes."
These activities fit most definitions of enterprise PLM. They're also activities Autodesk can support—even if it chooses not to hype that fact.
