3D CAD NEWS

CADCAMNet is reporting today that engineering IT stocks have, as a group, dropped 38% in 2008.

Of 47 stocks in the report, only two are up for the year, (Delcam and Navtec) while 14 are down 50% or more.

The article shows results for each of the 47 companies, and also by categories (AEC/GIS/Plant, MCAD/CAE, CAM/RP, Channel/Services/cPDM, and ECAD). As a category, ECAD is down the most, while MCAD/CAE is down the least.

More information: www.cadcamnet.com.

Just recently the CADCAMNet team has been researching a lot of leads about engineers and manufacturers delving into the field of Green engineering. CCN’s Green Engineering Reports are free, and are working towards understanding what it’s all about - how the choice of materials can change the nature of a product being designed, how to find recycled materials, what technology (and believe me, it’s few and far between) can help in green engineering.

So do check ‘em out if you are curious about how you would make your products green(er).  They are all down the right hand side of the CADCAMNet home page.

R

Here, in no particular order, telling no particular story, are some photos from COFES 2008, which took place last week in Scottsdale, Arizona.

If COFES keynote speaker Karl Ulrich had pulled peanuts out of his pocket, most of the 300 in attendance would have gladly eaten from his hands. The summary of the chart on display is “don’t spend so much time debating the merits of marginal and/or stupid projects” except that Ulrich said it like somebody who has a book on the subject coming out from Harvard Business School Press in 2009. That the need exists to say this in a power point and a book explains why innovation is a chimera in many manufacturing firms.

COFES co-founder and chief ramrod Brad Holtz swears on his grandmother’s grave that the selection of green as the shirt color for COFES staff was totally unconnected to the selection of this year’s conference theme of sustainability.

Bill Carrelli of Siemens PLM Software had a full house in the tech suite, but still wouldn’t divulge what the big announcement coming April 22 is all about.

Most sports fans have heard of the San Diego Chicken. This is the San Diego Grouse, technical name Steveious Wolfeious.

Anton van den Hengel flew from Australia (where he is director of the Australian Center for Visual Technologies) to speak to COFES for five minutes during the Maieutic Parataxis session. Afterwards COFES attendees mobbed him like groupies at a rock concert.

More to come.