The end of Creo Simulate ? 1

[creosimulateuser]

A friend of mine, who works at PTC, told me that a couple of months ago the core of Creo Simulate development group (the most experienced developers and managers) was suddenly laid off.

You may want to take this into account while planning your future Simulation work.

 

[PTCFischer]

Hi creosimulateuser,

My name is Mark Fischer, Director of Product Management at PTC responsible for Creo Simulate. I came across your posting and wanted to provide a response and clarification to your comments.

Creo Simulate continues to be a key offering in the PTC Product Portfolio, and our vision is to continue developing it to satisfy the needs of our customers interested in performing more analysis, earlier in the design process. In 2014, PTC will be shipping the Creo 3.0 release, which include several enhancements to the Creo Simulate capabilities and there is no plan to discontinue new development on any products in the Creo Product Family. For future releases, PTC will continue to monitor market trends, listen to our customers and introduce new capabilities to provide a compelling solution for our customer.

To address your comments on development, Creo Simulate development was balanced between a number of our R&D facilities around the world. One of the core R&D teams responsible for Creo Simulate is based in our Pune, India facility. This team has been actively developing Creo Simulate for several years, and have a deep level of understanding of the product. This team remains focused and are committed to the success of Creo Simulate.

If you have any questions pertaining to this discussion, I welcome your emails and comments. You can email me directly at mfischer@ptc.com.

Regards,
Mark Fischer
PTC - Director, Partner Strategy and Simulation Products

 

[creosimulateuser]

Totally predictable official reply, but according to my sources inside PTC it's not entirely true.

 

[PTCFischer]

Hi Creosimulateuser,

I certainly can understand your concern, but again stress PTC is 100% committed to our simulate offerings. As I mentioned above, I would be open to a fruitful conversation to discuss your concerns. As for your sources, this does concern me as they are conveying incorrect information.

We have a lot of exciting projects planned and with the upcoming release launching in 2014, PTC Creo Simulate has a very bright future.

Happy Holidays!

Regards,
Mark

 

[creosimulateuser]

Sure, Creo 3 release may be relatively good (assuming that remaining few developers in India can fix all serious bugs without leading developers/managers guiding them) but I highly doubt that subsequent releases will have any semblance of new features.

 

[dgallup]

If you have anything to share beyond FUD (fear, uncertainty & doubt), I would like to hear it. Otherwise you sound like a troll.

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The Help for this program was created in Windows Help format, which depends on a feature that isn't included in this version of Windows.

 

[creosimulateuser]

I know how it looks.
Unfortunately, I'm afraid I cannot say more without giving out some hints that may reveal my source at PTC.

 

[PTCFischer]

Hi Creosimulateuser,

As I stated above, I am always available to discuss your concerns and reinforce PTC's position related to simulation.

Regards,
Mark

 

[shaun8567]

Mark,

On another forums site (I think MCADCentral) someone who stated that they were the, "chairman of the PTC/User Technical Committee" said that the entire San Jose team was dissolved; is this true?

 

[creosimulateuser]

That's exactly what I was talking about. The most experienced developers and managers were all located in the US. There also were a few developers in India who played supporting role, and now they are tasked with supporting and advancing entire product line. One can imagine what can come out of this... especially in terms of product quality.

Of course PTC will try to convince you that nothing changed, they need your maintenance money.

 

[PTCFischer]

Hi Shaun8567,

There has been a lot of gossip around the departure of the San Jose Simulation development team. Let me try to address your concerns....

In an effort to optimize the product development of Creo Simulate we looked to create a center of excellence for Simulation development. The chosen location was India and thus we shut down the San Jose office. India has and will remain the main development center for Creo Simulate and the rest of our simulation products (MDX/MDO and BMX). The team in India (15 people focused on Creo Simulate) has been actively developing Creo Simulate for several years (most 10+ years), and have a deep level of understanding of the product. This team remains focused and are committed to the success of Creo Simulate.

While the team in San Jose were focused on specific details of Simulate - Mesher and Solver Engine, the team in India worked hand in hand with them to introduce functionality, resolve issue and support the product.

Last week we presented to the Simulate TC as part of the midyear TC event at PTC HQ. Along with our development lead, I presented the new functionality coming in Creo 3.0, as well as, our thoughts for Creo 4.0. The TC members were very encouraged with the direction and what is on the horizon.

As I stated to creosimulateuser, if you have questions pertaining to this discussion, I welcome your emails and comments. You can email me directly at mfischer@ptc.com.

Regards,
Mark

 

[shaun8567]

"In an effort to optimize the product development of Creo Simulate we looked to create a center of excellence for Simulation development. The chosen location was India and thus we shut down the San Jose office."

So, to put to plainly, the US development team was outsourced to India to reduce operations cost? That's the only reasoning I can come up with.

I had the privilege about a year ago to go to the San Jose facility and speak with some of the developers (like Christos, Tad, and Eduardo), so I'm a little worried what kind of impact this will have on the software due to the loss in brain trust (if I recall correctly, they all have PhD's from very prestigious universities). I'm also a little worries how this will effect the robustness/stability of the software, and whether there is/will be an impact on service tickets. I know that, for example, between WF5 and Creo 2.0 there seems to be an issue with the solver when doing a LDA with arc-length control active. The model solves in WF5, but fails in 2.0 (I have already submitted a ticket, just haven't gotten a response yet).