Thursday, July 17, 2008

Poll Results-Autodesk release Cycle

CAD-a-Blog conducted a readers poll (completely unscientific of course) to see how often you think Autodesk should release a new version of AutoCAD. This seems to be a hot topic at the moment due to many users unhappiness with AutoCAD 2009.

Here is what you said:

Out of 45 readers participating (I know, not that many) nobody wanted a 6 month cycle. I don't even think this is possible unless there is only one item to the update.

2% of the voters would like to see an 8 month cycle!! That's fast, and again, I'm not sure that's possible either.

4% wanted a 12 month (or yearly) cycle, which Autodesk has done since the 2003 release of AutoCAD 2004. It would seem that most people are unhappy or not fully satisfied with this type of a cycle.

13% would like to see an 18 month cycle which would be every year and a half, or two releases in a three year period. They would like to see Autodesk take a little bit more time to work on the program.

49% of the voters would like to see a 24 month, or bi-annual release of AutoCAD, that's almost half.

31% of users participating said a 36 month or three release cycle is the way to go. Is that too long of a wait?
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Well, this pole is clearly not scientific, or far reaching enough for us to make any conclusions about the users. However, it does seem to coincide with other polls and discussions on the internet. It seems that keeping up with AutoCAD every year is becoming a hassle for many of its users, managers, and companies.

How long before this rapid release cycle takes a big enough toll on companies where they stop upgrading every year? there are many problems with a yearly release cycle on the users end, cost is the biggest, or course. Everything comes down to the bottom line. Autodesk has to serve not only their clients, but their stockholders. In fact, the big guns in charge at Autodesk answer first to the stockholders. The stockholders answer to their desire for valuable stock. In order to affect change in the stockholders perspective, the stock has to change value. The more profitable it is the more they will stay the same, and more of it. The less valuable it is, the more likely they are to change policy.

My point here is that everyone involved is in this thing to make money. Autodesk wants to make money selling the software to users. Users want to make money selling drawings, models, etc. by using the software. Perhaps the best question to ask is what do the user's clients need? That will dictate what the users will purchase and how they will work and for how much. Which will in turn direct Autodesk on what and how to produce in their software.

Sometimes the software provider, in its interest, has to create a need, hence the verticals of AutoCAD. Many users didn't know that they needed new and improved software to do their jobs until it was available. It's like color TV. Nobody knew the needed it until it was available. they were happy with black and white TV.

That's my two cents, please don't ask for change!!

Happy CADDING.

2 comments:

  1. Hey, I'm an Autodesk employee (I choose to remain anonyomous).

    I'm 100% against the yearly release cycle. I have no inside knowledge as to why we continue to stick with it, but when I look at the big(ger) boys in software (MS, Adobe, etc.) I don't see any of them enslaving themselves to a yearly release. I'm sure there are high-flying corporate reasons for it -- something abstract related to a particular 'business model', but certainly I do not think that a yearly release cycle is a good thing. 12 months is just an arbitrary amount of time and to be constantly on the yearly-release treadmill has little or no benefit in my opinion.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I understand your view. Autodesk is a huge company, but it does not have the same audience as Microsoft nor as Adobe. Autodesk serves more of a niche audience. Though I would consider Autodesk to be "the Microsoft" of CAD. Since Microsoft serves everyone using a PC, they can not possibly release a new version every year. Imagine the chaos that would cause. Everything runs off of Windows.

    Back on topic. (though the above is an interesting conversation too)Since Autodesk's audience is smaller than Microsoft they can move a release more quickly. And, there are far fewer 3d party software programs (is that redundant?) running on AutoCAD than there are running on Windows. I feel comparing the two is not completely fair, not that I am defending the 12 month cycle.

    As a user, the 12 month cycle doesn't bother me. I can keep up with the software every 12 months on my own. As a firm having to keep my users up to date and my software/hardware up to date every year, well, that's different. It costs too much money for far too little benefit. Updating my software every two to three years is a far more acceptable model. Some firms would prefer to never change, well, that's just not reality and unwise.

    I do like having a regularly scheduled release date. That makes it easier to budget for firms that need this software. They know when to expect it.

    ReplyDelete

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