PTC PURCHASES ONSHAPE

Better Rental Pricing with a Perpetual Option
 Local control of your Engineering Data!

IronCAD - $1,500.00 Per Year - The Best Conceptual Design 3D CAD System

ZW3D Lite - $800.00 Per Year - Fully Functional 3D Mechanical Design

ZW3D Standard - $1,200.00 Per Year - The Ultimate 3D CAD System

If you would like more information or to download ZW3D or IronCAD

Before you consider any subscription based CAD system be sure you are willing to have a CAD company in total control of your precious Engineering Data or Intellectual Property Forever?

Onshape Subscription and Pricing

What happens if they raise the rate?

Can you go to another package?

What are the problems you will face?

• The models exported as dumb STEP models

• Drawings as PDF and the drawings will have to be recreated.

With a perpetual system, if you decide to move to another package or sell your company you will always have direct access to your legacy data.

Onshape has some Huge Problems!
Nails in the Coffin?

As a seasoned 3D CAD designer I don't care if the CAD system is in the Clouds or local. I am only interested in easily designing my parts and assemblies and getting the documentation to manufacturing. Document control is no problem for most single designers, but I want my customers engineering data and intellectual property stored locally and always accessible with a CAD product I "own".

10-30-17 Update

Onshape has some huge problems

Nails in the Coffin

Nail one! Subscription only!

Autodesk and PTC moved in 2018 to subscription only.

"Subscription Only" is not an option for any company that values its engineering information or IP (intellectual property). No company in their right mind can allow their IP to be locked under the control of any software package. I have heard that there are some very large firms that have demanded that Autodesk give them perpetual licenses. Trust me, as they lose users, subscription rates will go up.

This is not a cheap subscription

Standard - $1,500 per user per year

Professional - $2,100.00 per user per year

Two, much better 3D CAD solutions than Onshape!

IronCAD rents for $1500.00 Annually
ZW3D Lite rents for $600.00 Annually
ZW3D Standard rents for $900.00 Annually

All have a perpetual option plus ZW3D has a 6-month rental options and put "YOU" in control of your IP or engineering information.

You are Not Stuck with CAD Subscriptions!

Nail Two! File format that cannot be saved locally

This was the first problem I saw with Onshape. Not only is the access to your IP dependent on Onshape, is complete under their control, being stored on their servers. No smart company would put their IP at such risk.

I got into an debate with those that had a vested interest in Onshape. They said "You could just export the solid models as Step or other neutral format". I asked  "And use what software to modify those models".

Next Generation 3D CAD Technology Applied!

I told them that there may be AIDs (Associated Information Documents (drawings)) tied to those models. You have to have native CAD access to the associated documentation. It seems like there are quite a few people that really do not use 3D CAD for engineering, just sort of sell and talk about it.

Nail Three! Solidworks is now available on the Cloud.

The total purpose of Onshape was to convert Solidworks users. The founders were also those that created Solidworks, a poorly designed Pro/e clone on the PC. No, they were not innovators they were plagiarizers. But Solidworks is just the first of the popular programs that will be available on the cloud. The benefit of these programs over Onshape is that they can save their files locally and under the complete control of the company.

Sadly, Onshape as a 3D modeler is nothing but another Solidworks clone. They made sure that the software could easily be adopted by the Solidworks user. They could have introduced some innovation into the product that might have given them an edge. I gave them a demonstration of IronCAD, the most productive conceptual 3D CAD system, and none of the incredible functionality was incorporated. I truly do not think these people can think out of the Solidworks box!

Solidworks on the Cloud?

But there are viable uses for "FREE" Onshape?

Training

Its free access on the cloud offers the best training opportunity. All solid modelers operate about the same, history or direct edit. They all have only four functions, Extrude, Spin, Sweep and Loft. Once you understand these basics, other systems are relatively easy to learn. Creating the AID (Associated Information Document (drawing)) is the same as any other 3D CAD system.

Document Control

This is by far the most valuable potential feature of Onshape. They better wake up, it is only a matter of time before some other firm sees the value of standardized "Cloud Based" document control. If any of those PLM companies want to step into the future give me a call.

The Ultimate Engineering Document Control System

Cloud Based Engineering Document Control

Collaboration

While it is a good collaboration tool, the costs far out way the benefits. When it offered the 10 free projects I tried to use it with my non-engineering oriented clients and failed to stimulate their interests. We went back to 2D/3D PDFs and Skype meetings.

Model Translation

Onshape offers free access to all of the popular CAD packages. If your system does not read the popular CAD systems, Onshape is a great way to be compatible. Of course, you have to pay attention to proprietary information by importing and exporting in a neutral format then immediately deleting the part or assembly. The parts, assembly and any information is publically available.

Conclusion

Yes, unless something changes, I would say that Onshape's days are numbered.

2-4-16 Update

Onshape moved out of beta and now is a production product. There is no file format for an Onshape document. They only reside on a server that is maintained by Onshape. I thought about this and decided I would feel much more comfortable having my native engineering information stored locally and completely under my control. I cannot imagine any company putting their native engineering in the hands of a 3rd party. This is the main reason I would not move to Onshape as my design solution.

BUT.. yes there is a huge but. Onshape is the most incredible collaboration and engineering documentation tool. It does offer direct edit functionality to make small modifications when in the conceptual design stage. But is this worth the  $1500.00 per year. If you are a large corporation I am sure Oshape would do a custom install. If you are a small company this is truly the most cost effective and flexible PDM solution available. It virtually has no limitations.

You do not need a complex PDM or PLM system. You create a special deliverable. Upload the native or neutral file to Onshape, include any documents you like. You can duplicate any of the information and store on your local system. Probably less maintenance would be required than your existing PDM or PLM system. I am sure it would be much, much easier. We will not get into the incredibly high costs and complications of PLM.

Remember, this information can be made available to the user at any level of accessibility. This is the released documentation, not the native CAD data (even though a native file could be included). It is maintained by a special document control group who is the only one that can modify the document. You just create an Onshape Account. It is available from anywhere with access to a browser.

This is the best of both worlds. Your native 3D CAD data safely stored and available locally. Your engineering deliverable are easily available to the departments in your company, purchasing, marketing, tech pubs, sales, engineering, analysis, manufacturing, materials and to your approved suppliers. Easy to control access, permissions and tracking. It, of course, will take some paradigm shifts to make this happen since this area is heavily controlled by the vested interests of the popular 3D CAD companies. But the potential cost savings are enormous, rivaling the "in stone" drawing as the sole authority.

There is a bit more on this subject in this article:

The Secret of Part Numbers

Back to the Review

When I review a CAD system I do not look at what works I look for what doesn’t work and I have been doing this for decades. I was never in the Autocad world of electronic drawings. I started with 3D Computervision CADDS 4 in 1982. Then in 1986 I was introduced to PC based 3D CADKEY. I quickly became a dealer and founded TECH-NET. I was introduced to Trispectives, which became IronCAD in the early 1990’s. IronCAD is the best conceptual design CAD program and is still far ahead of any CAD system today. I was selling IronCAD in the mid 1990's and was offered Solidworks and after reviewing it, asked the fellow "Who would buy this??" How was I to know that Dassault was around the corner with a couple hundred million dollars? I still think they just bought it to scavenge the parametric history based technology for their Catia 5. Boeing had horrible Pro/e envy!! I tried to sell Pro/e and Solid Edge. But my experience was with much more productive systems and found these system just too complicated with their sketch, sketch, constrain, constrain, design process with the separate part, assembly and drawings. Just too much work.

So where would Onshape fit in the following article. Even in the beta, I would put it better than Inventor. Even though at this time it does not equal the functionality, we can be sure it will offer much more design flexibility in the future and it is FREE!!

Ref: The Worst to Best CAD System and Why

The reason why Autocad and Solidworks are the most popular CAD programs is not because of their quality, but because they didn’t have copy protection for a decade using what I call "Perpetual Evaluation" marketing. Making them virtually free!!! Both IronCAD and CADKEY put strict licensing over my objections. If they would have listened to me, the CAD world would have looked much different and not stuck in the convoluted Pro/e paradigm for over 25 years.

The Two CAD Programs that Set the Path to 3D MCAD Chaos!

Ref: 25 years of CAD Incompatibility

Update 5-5-15

Onshape is a work in progress and will always be. As long as it is free it will be of interest to all those that are in engineering and graphic design either as a CAD or collaboration tool.

I have been accepted as a consultant and am looking forward to helping bring this incredible tool to our industry.

Ease of Use: I have learned a few things as I have been using Onshape. I have been collaborating with customers that have never used CAD. With a few instructions they can view and control their CAD information.

I have been selling CAD/CAM for 28 years. For awhile many of the systems did not have copy protection and software was passed on to friends and associates who would use the software and soon purchase it or convinced their companies to purchase it. That was how Autocad and Solidworks got popular, but even they eventually put on strict copy protection. This became a problem for the user. They could not easily put the software on both their home or laptop computer.

With Onshape, being on the cloud, now any system can be your workstation, work, home, laptop, grandma's computer, anywhere. Now for many this is not a problem since they only do their work at the office. But just think of the telecommuting possibilities. Sales people have access to the latest information no matter where they are, even using their tablets. Manufacturing, planning, purchasing, tech pubs, marketing, sales, etc all have access to the latest information in one place in one "easy to use" format.

It was also a horror show for a company with many systems to deploy a new version of their CAD software.

Years ago one of my Boeing suppliers called and said IronCAD could not read a native Catia 5 file. I said, no problem (they had a Catia 5 station which they never used) just read the file directly into Catia and export a STEP. To their surprise, Boeing had upgraded to a new version of Catia 5 and never informed the suppliers.

This could never happen on Onshape. The latest version is totally controlled by Onshape. Version compatibility is a problem of the past. No one cares what system you use, all systems have direct edit functionality except for Catia 5. You can quit paying that, what can only be called a rip off, annual maintenance fee. Stuck with SW 2012, Inventor 2014, Catia 5 R19, etc. no worry Onshape translates all the prior and latest versions. Onshape at $100 a month is a steal for all it offers.

Onsite training will be a cruise. Why would any college teach anything else? This opens the door to local training. Requirement: A laptop, Apple or Microsoft!!

I am looking forward to be part, of what only be called, "A Movement". It truly has changed the paradigm of CAD and given us a new "Standard" which can allow Engineering to take back Engineering!

So let’s take a look at Onshape!!