
Software Giant Autodesk to Axe 13% of Global Workforce - tashapenguin
http://www.animationmagazine.net/people/software-giant-autodesk-to-axe-13-of-global-workforce/
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pzone
The 2016 layoffs of similar magnitude didn't seem to make a noticeable impact
in their software's update cadence. They are a company formed though an old
sediment of mergers and acquisitions and I'm not surprised they've built up
inefficiencies.

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stctgion
Do you realize that calling people inefficiencies sounds rather cold?

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pc86
Saying objectively that 12 people are doing the work of 8 isn't making any
value judgment on the 4 people who get let go.

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bhouston
Much of the layoffs tend to happen in North America and Europe and the hiring
is in China I understand at Autodesk. I do not have numbers to back that up
though, but it is my understanding.

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chli
As part of this restructuring they are closing the European HQ in Neuchâtel,
Switzerland, that's ~230 jobs. [1]

We have our offices next door and I feel sorry for them.

[1] [https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/software-
shock_autodes...](https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/business/software-
shock_autodesk-to-shut-neuch%C3%A2tel-offices/43716966)

~~~
teddyh
Hmm. The original founder of Autodesk still lives in Neuchâtel, Switzerland:
[https://www.fourmilab.ch/](https://www.fourmilab.ch/)

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chatmasta
Does anyone remember when Autodesk bought SocialCam? What a bizarre
acquisition that was. Although it brought us Mike Seibel who's been a great YC
partner.

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Ericson2314
I worry that Soon there will be no real investment in "professional" software,
the type with a learning curve that makes us more productive rather than more
ad-addicted.

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Ericson2314
(Unlike Photoshop, AutoCAD, etc, most enterprise software is insanely
arbitrary one-off stuff that essentially exists as hack for $megacorp to avoid
teaching their non-devs any programming.)

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mcguire
I don't know that it is to avoid any programming, but the point is pretty well
made. Most of the internal enterprise software I've worked on was intended to
follow insane and arbitrary policies that wouldn't stand up to scrutiny as a
public product.

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analognoise
I hope this doesn't effect the team working on EAGLE. EAGLE sucks, but it has
gotten much better since Autodesk took over and actually started making
improvements.

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LeifCarrotson
I hope the same for the teams working on 3DS and Maya.

For the ordinary product design/CNC workflow, Solidworks has been knocking the
pants off of Autodesk for the past several updates. It's overwhelmingly more
popular with new engineers.

They do have a few electrical and civil engineering products that are hard to
find elsewhere (and very hard to migrate from), but the bread and butter of a
CAD software company is that Inventor/AutoCAD/Fusion CAM workflow, and
Solidworks is just so much easier to use and equally powerful.

~~~
leon_sbt
I was a heavy user of Solidworks. I switched over to Fusion 360.

In my experience, I found Fusion 360 to be a better experience. The ability to
do parametric modeling, surfacing, CNC toolpaths,PDM data storage, "cloud" FEA
solving. Everything just works. I don't need to manage licensees from multiple
vendors. Set up runboxes for simulations. Manage my own PDM server (PITA).Or
re-learn 3rd party vendor specific UI/terminology.

On boarding new team members to projects is as easy entering their email
address.

Pricing is transparent,straight forward, and reasonable. All my data is auto
backed up to "the cloud".

Free for personal use, and commercial use under 100k of revenue. After that
the pricing is very reasonable and straightforward. $300 year for basic,
$1500/year for ultimate.

The Ultimate version includes shape optimization, 5 axis machining toolpaths,
and a few other things. If you had to piece that together from vendors. Your
looking at $40k a year per seat. The value is incredibility hard to beat.

Solidworks does have the lead in having a huge 3rd party plugin
system,weldements, wire routing. I did get thrown off from the idea of a "mate
to the idea of a "joint". It forces you not to use hacky practices when
building assemblies.

I feel that Fusion 360 has better product direction compared to Solidworks,
and with their SAAS based model can update users more frequently, when
compared to Solidwork's yearly basis. But honestly both products are VERY good
in general.

Note:Not affiliated with Autodesk in anyway shape or form, other than as an
end user. I just really like Fusion 360.

~~~
bhouston
What do you think of the re-imagining of Solidworks that is
[https://onshape.com](https://onshape.com)? Have you tried it?

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leon_sbt
I heard about it. I have never tried it. I believe the guy that started
Solidworks and sold it to Dassault Systemes is behind it. I'll give OnShape a
shot this weekend and report back.

I like how they have a free tier for public projects. It lowers the cost of
entry dramatically for people just want to "feel" out CAD. I remember when I
was little, that I had to visit some sketchy websites to "try" out CAD. It's a
great time to be alive now and play with things.

Just checked out their website. Linux support! I'm already 50% sold. My gripe
with Fusion 360 is that their is no Ubuntu support. That and Adobe CC is the
only reason why I haven't dissolved my windows machine.

~~~
leon_sbt
I just played with Onshape for a little bit.

My overall impressions are good! The program completely redefines my thoughts
for capabilities of DOM based applications and WebGL.

Pros: Use anywhere on any device(Linux)! (DOM Based) Free for personal use.
Scripting based design automation seems like first class citizens with the
part monitoring and profiling features Sheet metal capabilities are easy and
intuitive. Something that I can't say for Solidworks. You can straight up
delete things in Onshape, Fusion 360 makes that a bit hard. I like the fact
that parts and assemblies are two explicitly different things.(Solidworks does
this) It makes it easier for my brain to cut the "pie". Fusion does it a more
NX'y way where "a part is a part/assembly". I don't have much experience with
surfacing, so I can't comment about that aspect. Git like branch/merge
functionality with parts.

Cons:

It ain't the whole widget.. At the end of the day it's "just" a CAD program.
Which is fine, but I feel that most consumers are getting "finer" tastes with
the advent of "the whole widget" design. Thanks Apple. (I don't mean that in a
negative way either.) The thing that blew my mind about Fusion 360, is that
CAM is integrated and just works, CLOUD Based FEA/Rendering just works, FEA
Analysis it's there, Topological optimization there too. Rendering it's there
also.

    
    
       I see that on the apps developers on Onshape's store, are taking notice. Now you can download CAM add-on, render add-on, etc. I'm 
       scared that this is going the way of Solidworks/Jira/Confluence. Where you buy the base program. ($100 per month, then add CAM 
       /rendering/FEA separately). That $100 per month now looks like $200 per month. Now you are tied to vendor specific systems. Now you're 
       dependent on vendors for fixing their stuff  when OnShape pushes an update. If the 3rd party vendor folds. Now all your legacy data is 
       effectively worthless. Or if there are problems, then 3rd party vendor blames Onshape, or Onshape blames vendor. 
    
       If Onshape makes the whole widget, then I have high confidence when an update is pushed, then CAM still works, render still works, and the UI is very 
       similar feeling. It makes me have trust that my "mechanical engineering workflow" just works. 
    
       When I use my mechanical engineering workflow. I want to be able to go from rough idea to CAD to FEA to render to 2d part drawings to CAM to "Part is 
       literally in my hand". With as little friction as possible. Adobe CC and Fusion 360 do this very well. I feel that with these industries where the data 
       model is incredibly complex. Own the whole pie is a requirement. Does that mean you need to lock-in your users? No. Give them escape hatches so they can use 
       familiar programs at whatever stage. Export as X, works well for this situation. But the main focus is making the UX/UI seamless between CAD/CAM/CAE. Fusion 
       360 in my opinion demolishes onShape in this regard.
    
       Random side note. In the software engineering field, Companies that control the entire widget is "frowned upon". With good reason. The "data models" are 
       usually only text based (.C, .py, .js, .yaml,etc), and have  open source standards associated with it. Meaning if you write Python in Visual Studio, the 
       same Python code will work in PyCharm. This is good. That means past the IDE stage, The files coming out are "clean and non-propriety", which allows you to 
       use any git-client you want. Git is open source and has a non-proprietary data model. So now you have the choice of using Github,Bitbucket,Gitlabs, etc. If 
       you don't like one, then switching is "painless".
    
       Same goes for CI (Travis,Pipelines, etc,) To cloud providers (Kubernetes on Google Cloud, AWS, Azure etc). You're never locked in, since the data model at each stage is straightforward (text-based, that is interpreted to commonly agreed upon standards).
    
       The CAD/CAM/CAE industry is nothing like this....which is why owning the whole widget, until/if common data models become prevalent.
    
    

OnShape's value proposition is a bit weak compared to Fusion 360.

Fusion 360 is free under ($100k of revenue per year), $300 a year for basic,
and $1500 a year for Ultimate. (Basic will work for like 95% of users).

OnShape is free for personal/non-commercial use and everything needs to be
publicly accessible. Then to go from personal to commerical/private. It's
$1500 a year...just for CAD. Want the other features that Fusion 360 has? Open
your wallet...

Fusion 360 in many respects, functions as a great drug dealer. They give you a
little for free. They supply more value for you, as you need it. But the
pricing is never so high , where you need to make hard call, and stop using
their drugs. You grow with your drug dealer. Onshape is like "Here's enough
for one hit", but if you want any more than that. Here's a brick, and I won't
give it in little bags so you can give it to your friends at parties. You need
to do it yourself....It's also a felony if you screw up when you try to buy in
big.

Here's a good use case: I'm an at home inventor that wants to do a
Kickstarter/Sharktank product. With OnShape, since it's commercial I need to
front $1500 a year to solve only one piece of my product pie. Then more cash
after that. With Fusion 360, I pay $0. If it takes off and I make over $100k.
Paying $300 bucks a year is literally not a problem.

With this use case: OnShape isn't even on the radar for a CAD product to use.

But I always root for the underdog. But they have some work to do before they
can have the same impact as Solidworks when came in out in the 90's. The DOM
based app is really cool, and has alot of potential. But I don't plan on doing
CAD on my Pixel2. The CAD/CAM/CAE workflow matters an order of magnitude more.
Here's the cool thing. All of that can be computed in the DOM, so it can be
developed down the line.

For year of 2015+ products, Fusion has the crown now.

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sime2009
Thanks for reporting your experiences here even though this discussion ended 3
days ago(!)

~~~
leon_sbt
Your 100% right. I told the original responded that I would report back. I
felt obligated. :) I sent him my response via email too, so my time input
wouldn't die in vain..

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virgilp
Interesting, given how at some point they were given as an example of "old
software company that actually managed to hop on the mobile train". Guess the
mobile train turned to be less important than originally thought (at least
from a revenue perspective).

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margorczynski
Probably just cutting the standard big-corp fat. If I'm correct their
financial results are great, in many areas even improving

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adventured
It's much worse than that unfortunately.

Pre-tax income 2013: $310m on $2.3b in sales

Pre-tax income 2014: $279m on $2.26b in sales

Pre-tax income 2015: $83m on $2.5b in sales

Pre-tax income 2016: -$20m on $2.46b in sales

Pre-tax income last four quarters: -$544m on $1.95b in sales

Net income for 2013 was $247m, for 2014 it was $228m, for 2015 it was $81m.
For the last eight quarters, it's nearly a negative billion dollars.

Net tangible assets 2015: $676 million

Net tangible assets 3Q17: -$1.3 billion

Their business is in trouble.

To make matters worse, they've got a $24 billion market cap. When times were
good in 2013, they'd have been sporting a near 100 PE ratio with that market
cap. Today it's particularly crazy, given they've had net negative growth over
the last five years and they're losing a lot of money.

Fair value in my opinion is closer to 70% lower than what they're trading for
right now. That's assuming 30 times earnings on getting back to $230m +/\- in
net income. In more normal times that 30 PE would be very rich for a zero
growth company. A more skeptical look at them, would be they're worth 85% to
90% less than what they're trading for today, if their business continues to
contract or remains weak and they struggle to get back to something more like
$80m to $100m in net income.

~~~
bhouston
Autodesk continuously touts that they are in a big transition from product
sales to subscription and that huge growth is just around the corner. Do you
discount those claims?

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adventured
I don't see why it would be necessary to discount such claims. The claims are
worthless. They're not worth considering at all, until they _prove something_
(and right now they're running a substantial credibility deficit).

Ten years of zero net growth, and four years of declining profitability,
should tell you everything you need to know about what's actually happening.
They've spent most of their profits from the last decade on faking EPS growth
with buybacks while their business was languishing. Now things are so bad,
they're hatcheting their most valuable resource: their people.

I think they spent ~$188 million buying back their stock in the first quarter,
while losing over $100m in operating income. They paid $85 per share for those
shares. Around 80 times earnings, if earnings were still at the old 2013
levels.

It's financial suicide. They're driving Autodesk into a wall at high speeds,
while destroying their balance sheet trying to keep the stock propped up with
buybacks far beyond what they can actually afford based on present
profitability and a reasonable outlook the next few years (which is why
they're firing 13% of their staff).

Or put it another way. The cost of the share buyback announced last year could
cover the cost of the 13% of workers that are getting fired, for at least two
decades.

Autodesk long ago got into the IBM financial engineering business. The
consequences of that are getting more unavoidable by the year.

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sitkack
> Or put it another way. The cost of the share buyback announced last year
> could cover the cost of the 13% of workers that are getting fired, for at
> least two decades.

Do you have any pointers on how to do this kind of financial analysis of a
public company?

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santaclaus
What products will this effect? Maya is essentially in maintenance mode, so I
don't think that will get any worse...

Hopefully these employees land on their feet!

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pzone
They've announced the majority of cuts involve terminating a few speculative
R&D projects and cutting international sales staff.

Maya development doesn't seem slow at all. The new UV toolkit in 2018 is
pretty great. On the backend, they migrated to Qt 5 last year, and 2018
introduces major changes to the plugin API aiming for greater stability and
backward compatibility.

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afinlayson
They have done so many 10% or more layoffs in the last 9 years, it's hard to
keep track.

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justonepost
Lol, I just got an interview offer from Autodesk on Monday via LinkedIn.. Uhh,
no thanks.

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GFischer
I've seen that plenty of big companies lay off people with the left hand and
continue hiring with the right - usually for different teams on different
locations.

I'm not as enthusiastic to work in one of those megacorps as I once was, and
yes, if they decide to do a layoff round next year you could be affected, but
I guess that at the very least you'd have one year of employment there.

~~~
chrisbennet
I'd still be hesitant. When a company is cutting jobs because they are in
trouble, they become somewhat unpredictable. The hiring manager you're talking
to may himself be out of job in a couple of weeks.

Example: Someone my wife knows moved to a different state to take a job with a
big financial firm (Fidelity) and they got "laid off" before they even
started.

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yuchi
Can a single damn news source stop using metaphors in their titles?… I _infer_
there’s a huge lay off here…

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lsiebert
Now I'm picturing an onion article about axing employees with actual axes.

