Bentley executives took to WebEx to explain their recent acquisitions of STAAD and RAM. In his introduction, Greg Bentley described STAAD as having analysis for all disciplines and parts of the world, while RAM specialized in structural analysis.
The overarching thought at Bentley is now: Integrating engineering is vital. He quoted a NIST study that sez $16 billion is wasted due to lack of integration [but we don't know that integrated engineering would recover that].
Most interesting quote: "We now have everything we seek in acquisitions" -- with no qualifiers. I've asked Bentley whether this statement is specific to AEC analysis, or if applies to Bentley as a whole. Answer: There will be more acquisitions.
Update
John Lynch was introduced as the one at Bentley in charge of examining integration of analysis into AEC. (He is the former Autodesk CTO, and then launched Design Variations in 1999.) All MCAD software is integrated into analysis software, but that is not the case in AEC. Emphasis on data loss during translation to and from analysis software [hmm... I thought was the point of IAI's IFCs].
Buddy Cleaveland noted that "Bentley has the right sales model: direct sales and support, not transactions." Not sure what he meant by "transactions"; I've asked about that.
Update 2
Mike Markovitz is talking about making Bentley's analysis software working with Microstation and competitors, primarily software from Autodesk. They plan to have an interface for Revit in a couple of months. [But doesn't this involve translation? Ans: Bentley plans a link between RAM and Revit that involves translation, because the object models are different; there may be some load and connectivity cases that differ between the two; it will be a directional (one-way) translator.] This will clash with Autodesk's plans for analysis hooks for Revit Structural.
Santanu Das is showing a slide that indicates IFC, APIs, CIS/2, and and SDNF are needed to translate between analysis and design software. Does Bentley plan to eliminate the translation they say is causing problems? Ans: Translations will be used where necessary, but integration will be the norm for Bentley's own software.
Update 3
Das is showing another slide, but it's not clear where translation is happening. Maybe we can get an answer during the Q&A later.
John Lynch now: "Comprehensive structural design from a single source," along with support, training, subscriptions, and "filling in the gaps" of missing analysis types.
This conference includes the message (ie, repeated statement) that Bentley is a pioneer in subscription licensing.
Update 4
Lynch makes the claim that Bentley customers are now part of the largest structural design community in the world. Bentley will make an increased focus on structural design. "Bentley is know for its easy business relationships." Bentley employees are now called "colleagues."
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