Personal CAD

Looks like Greg Milliken, CEO of Alibre, has come up with a novel way of marketing his software. He calls it Personal CAD and is suggesting that the market for a personal CAD system is “immense”. According to him, we live in times of oursourcing and off-shoring when an employee can be fired at a moment’s notice, irrespective of the sweat and toil that he has put into the company. And so he suggests that designers should learn a personal CAD system, like his Alibre Design, in order to make themselves more employable in the unfortunate event that they are fired.

Sounds a little like FUD (Fear Uncertainity Doubt), something Greg has accused SolidWorks of doing to Alibre. So is Greg now using FUD to his advantage or is there is real need for a personal CAD system?

It is quite evident from his post that he is targeting 2D users, especially AutoCAD users – something which every other CAD vendor is doing. It is also quite evident that whichever vendor manages to get away with a sizable chunk of AutoCAD users is going to make a lot of money.

Over the past few years, I have seen many marketing campaigns specifically aimed at AutoCAD users. This is by far one of the most ingenious ones I have come across. It may sound like FUD, or maybe it even is FUD. Either way, it does make a lot of sense. Designers who stick to AutoCAD are going to go where AutoCAD goes. And right now I am not quite sure where AutoCAD is headed.

AutoCAD is and most probably will always will be a 2D CAD system. And Greg is asking AutoCAD users whether they want to risk being stuck in the 2D world. A question worth answering.