Trimble acquires Gehry Technologies

[Eduardo Rolon]

If my order is correct. First Tekla, then SketchUp, VICO and now GT.

http://architosh.com/2014/09/famed-architect-frank-gehrys-much-beloved-gehry-technologies-gt-has-bee...

[Erika Epstein]

WOW

[Link]

Good luck patching all those softwares together! Doubt they will be any more successful at talking to each other than AutoDesk's products! 🙂

Cheers,
Link.

[Laszlo Nagy]

One interesting thing is that the Digital Project BIM application is not part of the deal:

http://www.architectmagazine.com/mergers-and-acquisitions/trimble-navigation-grows-aec-presence-with...

Nevertheless, it seems to me that Trimble is emerging as a player in the same league as Autodesk and it is working on creating a complete Design-Build-Operate application protfolio.

[stefan]

Indeed an interesting evolution. Was not aware that Digital Project itself was not part of the deal. That makes no sense, actually, from an outsiders point of view.

With SketchUp they have the early design. With Vico that cater for contractors and planners/estimators.

With Gehry Technologies and their CATIA customisations, they might appeal to the fabricators, high-profile designers/engineers that make constructible models.

Wonder how this will evolve.

What is left apart from Autodesk, Nemetschek and now Trimble? One of them might pick up Solibri as well...

[Laszlo Nagy]

Well, there is Bentley with MicroStation, but Bentley is big in infrastructure AFAIK, less emphasis on AEC on their part.

[Bricklyne Clarence]

laszlonagy wrote:
One interesting thing is that the Digital Project BIM application is not part of the deal:

http://www.architectmagazine.com/mergers-and-acquisitions/trimble-navigation-grows-aec-presence-with...

Nevertheless, it seems to me that Trimble is emerging as a player in the same league as Autodesk and it is working on creating a complete Design-Build-Operate application protfolio.

If I had to guess, I would imagine that that would be because Digital Project runs on the same engine as CATIA (or at least similar technology) developed by Dassault Systemes in partnership with Gehry Technologies (when, or after he designed the Guggenheim Bilbao), which would imply that they were licensing issues (CATIA is still developed and owned (it's technological intellectual property rights) by Dassault Systemes) that they probably couldn't untangle to acquire it outright along with the rest of Gehry Technologies.

So basically all they acquired in this deal is the consulting and services part of Gehry Technologies and not the actual product that they've become famous for.
Which in some sense actually makes sense because the Digital Project BIM Suite would mostly be duplicating what they already have with VICO, but with higher-end and more expensive software.

On some level I suppose it's logical, but as I mentioned already, one would have thought that the real meat and potatoes of such a deal would have been Digital Project and not just the consulting services they offer (which are also mostly based in the implementation of DP into projects)