Hi Maurice,
It seems to me nobody wants to do maintenance on what's worth while at
AD, innovation is where the short term success is, so that's where the
focus should be. I know this is a rhetorical question, but what do you
think the lifespan of the fruits the innovations at AD will be with a
business model like that ?
-Ronald
On 3/9/2014 5:51, Maurice Patel wrote:
Hi Sebastian,
I'll try to answer your question as best I can. I have been reading the threads
and trying to figure out how best to answer questions like the one you posed,
or even if it was worth it. Especially, given the fact that there is no real
reason for anyone here to trust anything I say. I would feel the same if I were
standing in your shoes - and I have in the past. Before I answer your question
officially for Autodesk I would like to share my own personal experience of
situations like these. Once, rather Ironically, when I was working for
Softimage in 2000, their leadership team asked me to communicate the decision
to stop development on Media Illusion (another acquisition) to our customers,
many of whom I had personally trained. These things do not get any easier with
time.
The decision to make Softimage 2015 the last release was not made because of cost-issues - that is to say
it was not done to reduce the operating expenses of the M&E division - which is why there was no
reduction in work force. The decision was made so that we could focus our efforts on fewer projects
enabling us to better execute on them and free resources to research new areas of innovation. Luc-Eric
explained this in a bit more detail earlier. The decision was made at the end of last year after many
months of deliberation and it was not something that was undertaken lightly (Autodesk's annual strategic
planning cycle, when decisions like these are typically made, kicks off in earnest in September). There
were many factors that led to that decision and although hindsight is great these factors are not always
predictable. Several of the plans we had previously made did not work out as expected and so evolved
significantly over time. Anyone who has ever had to manage a business or project will probably be familiar
with the fact that plans can change quite rapidly (and in unexpected directions) as new events occur and
you react to them. To quote someone a whole lot smarter than I: "the best laid plans of mice and men
often go astray." We were optimistic that some of the R&D methodologies and innovations we were
experimenting with would prove more fruitful than they did (e.g. projects like skyline). Does that mean we
should not have attempted them? Personally, I think we need to try and do new things even if we know that
99% of attempts at innovation will end in failure - after all they sometimes end in success (e.g. Bifrost).
Ultimately when we say "focus" what we mean is better balancing our finite resources so that we
can still invest in new research projects - even if these might fail - while continuing to evolve and
improve existing customer workflows. To enable us to continue the former we had to focus on Maya and 3ds
Max for the latter.
Regards
maurice
Maurice Patel
Autodesk : Tél: 514 954-7134
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Sebastien Sterling
Sent: Saturday, March 08, 2014 9:55 PM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Update to the Softtimage Transition Plan
Maurice ? is softimage being discontinued because of cost issues ?
or because it is impeding other AD products ?
it may seem redundant, but this question has not been answered.
--
Ronald van Vemden
-----------------------------------------------
3D Graphics & Animation
Cyberfish Laboratories | www.cyberfish.nl
Toonafish | www.toonafish.nl
tel. +31(0)20 5289291
fax +31(0)20 5289292
email: [email protected]
