Electronics > Altium Designer

Todays Melbourne AGE article. Altium CIO Alan Perkins quoted on Cloud future

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wilfred:
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EEVblog:

--- Quote from: wilfred on January 25, 2012, 11:26:20 pm ---This piece (excerpt) was in an article in today's Melbourne AGE. Titled SUNCORP appoints Oracle,

It doesn't say much but here it is,

Altium CIO Alan Perkins said the cloud subscription model means customers are demanding more than just regular software updates but also content delivery services.

--- End quote ---

Absolute bullshit. Altium's customers are demanding no such thing. Just the usual rhetoric designed to sell their new vision, which will almost certainly fail, just like most of their other visions. But no doubt they'll be able to find one or two customers who will say that stuff is imporatnt too them, and then they use that for justification that's what everyone wants.
The only thing the customers are demanding is a better PCB tool.


--- Quote ---The company is developing a cloud app store for electronics components where engineers can download libraries, and designs, he said. The software will plug into the wider electronics supply chain.

"As we move inexorably away from a packaged perpetual licensing model to a subscription-based content-driven service model where people pay for renewed services every year, the product will increase its content delivery services," he said.

He said the flexible nature of paying for cloud computing services means the company is more agile in deciding its IT priorities, like a fisherman with a scalable net.

"If you see a big school of fish you can instantaneously expand the size of the net when you're on the boat, and once you have caught all the fish, you can shrink the net back down again."

--- End quote ---

Makes absolutely no difference in Altium's market, except to convolute and confuse installation, updating, licensing, and library downloads etc.
All the (nice) stuff they are doing with the vendor integration and library updates can be done without all this cloud rubbish.

Dave.

Rufus:

--- Quote from: wilfred on January 25, 2012, 11:26:20 pm ---Altium CIO Alan Perkins said the cloud subscription model means customers are demanding more than just regular software updates but also content delivery services.
--- End quote ---

The delusional drivel from Altium continues. They didn't need the cloud to provide updates.

Their 'content' is going to be library components which people won't pay much if anything for. A lot of places won't use library components without thoroughly checking them which takes almost as long as it does to create them. I suppose their other content is going to be FPGA IP and firmware support for their failed 'one day all electronics will be systems on FPGAs' vision and that vision is going to continue to fail.

IMO Alan Perkins is a complete dickhead (who now describes himself as a Cloud Computing Pioneer), of all the people Altium should have ditched to avoid going bust he should have been top of the list. You can find a video of him on youtube waxing lyrical about salesforce.com. "Altium uses salesforce.com as a complete business platform" he says, hey Alan, check your head count and stock price recently? Your business is up shit creek with a small Chinese paddle, the 'platform' didn't work too well did it.

mobbarley:
sounds like an attempt to just get more and more people locked in to a subscription plan.

amspire:
Lots of other companies are trying to go to subscription option, but I really hate any design package that does not give you a perpetual right to open your designs.

I love seeing design documents from projects done 50 years ago, and the thought that in fifty years, probably none of the current design files will be useable sickens me a bit. Good designs are a work of art, and they shouldn't be thrown away like junk.

All these companies have a big problem in that they need to get money from customers every year. If they have produced a good piece of software, then customers don't really need to update it at all. If it does a good job today, it will do the same job in ten years. I understand the situation that companies like Altium see themselves in, but I think the solution is pricing at a price where anyone can afford the package, and an upgrade price that makes it a no-brainer.

I also avoid activated software as much as possible for the same reason - I want to be able to load software from 10 years ago so I can open an old project. I do not want to find that a company no longer activates that 10 year old piece of software.

My current solution is to use KiCad, and I will have a go at gEDA. It is a bit raw, but I had a quick play with the PCB package and I quite liked it.

Richard.

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