The Future of PC-DMIS BUGS

The Future of PC-DMIS Bugs
A short story by Ego Murphy

In the future, Hexagon will finally be sold and the principal shareholders will become quite wealthy.
The buyer will be a company very much larger than Hexagon was, probably one with large, if not dominating, involvement in the 3D modeling and manufacturing software markets.

Hexagon North America (the division that used to be called Hexagon Metrology or the CMM stuff), which is but a small piece of Hexagon's vast global empire, will be included in the sale. This is very important, as despite the small size this little chunk contains a certain cash cow named PC-DMIS SMA Profits that Hexagon really doesn't want to sell but they're going to have to in order to complete the whole deal.

Immediately the sharp axes will trim away the vestiges of Hexagon's Old Boy Network (itself a twisted outgrowth of Brown & Sharp's rotten old network that bankrupted that company) and at the same time many, many talented and smart people will be fleeing Hexagon voluntarily out of fear of the axe. These two exit avenues won't cripple the company but definitely slow it down.

The talented rising stars (i.e, corporate ladder climbers) that the new owners put in charge of their new acquisition will undoubtedly be made away of the notorious bugginess of the cash-cow product, and at the same time a miniscule fraction of the product user base (that's us forum peeps) will launch a vocal smear campaign to broadcast it to the actual target market - the manufacturing concern managers who buy CMMs and CMM software. A ton of money and other resources will be poured into the Software Development Division Formerly Known As Wilcox, and over time a slight improvement will be gradually felt... but not enough. And then someone will display true bravery and make the call: Backwards Compatible will end and a new software foundation will be laid that's reliable and robust.

Here the crystal ball goes cloudy as future paths diverge:
Some new software, or more likely a new hardware-software combo, may disrupt the market and PC-DMIS and Hexagon hardware goes the way of FLB and Sheffield hardware. All the bug fixes in the world can't make buggy whips successful in the custom-chrome-wheels market, right?
A large armed conflict may disrupt the global economy and bankrupt and/or physically destroy those not profiting from it, which can bankrupt vendors such as CMM suppliers.
Unhappy with the poor performance of their new acquisition ("You can't polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter." - Dilbert), the owners may sell Hex off again or even break it up and sell off chunks to other metrology companies eager to grab the huge amount of high-tech Intellectual Property that Hexagon had acquired on it's decades-long spending spree. Perhaps the highest bidder for the PC-DMIS cash cow is a competitor who puts a bullet in it's head, or a young energetic and highly incompetent new company who free-fall into insolvency and fail to maintain the software.

In any case, the bugs will go away eventually. All things must pass.

The Future of PC-DMIS Bugs
A short story by Ego Murphy

In the future, Hexagon will finally be sold and the principal shareholders will become quite wealthy.
The buyer will be a company very much larger than Hexagon was, probably one with large, if not dominating, involvement in the 3D modeling and manufacturing software markets.

Hexagon North America (the division that used to be called Hexagon Metrology or the CMM stuff), which is but a small piece of Hexagon's vast global empire, will be included in the sale. This is very important, as despite the small size this little chunk contains a certain cash cow named PC-DMIS SMA Profits that Hexagon really doesn't want to sell but they're going to have to in order to complete the whole deal.

Immediately the sharp axes will trim away the vestiges of Hexagon's Old Boy Network (itself a twisted outgrowth of Brown & Sharp's rotten old network that bankrupted that company) and at the same time many, many talented and smart people will be fleeing Hexagon voluntarily out of fear of the axe. These two exit avenues won't cripple the company but definitely slow it down.

The talented rising stars (i.e, corporate ladder climbers) that the new owners put in charge of their new acquisition will undoubtedly be made away of the notorious bugginess of the cash-cow product, and at the same time a miniscule fraction of the product user base (that's us forum peeps) will launch a vocal smear campaign to broadcast it to the actual target market - the manufacturing concern managers who buy CMMs and CMM software. A ton of money and other resources will be poured into the Software Development Division Formerly Known As Wilcox, and over time a slight improvement will be gradually felt... but not enough. And then someone will display true bravery and make the call: Backwards Compatible will end and a new software foundation will be laid that's reliable and robust.

Here the crystal ball goes cloudy as future paths diverge:
Some new software, or more likely a new hardware-software combo, may disrupt the market and PC-DMIS and Hexagon hardware goes the way of FLB and Sheffield hardware. All the bug fixes in the world can't make buggy whips successful in the custom-chrome-wheels market, right?
A large armed conflict may disrupt the global economy and bankrupt and/or physically destroy those not profiting from it, which can bankrupt vendors such as CMM suppliers.
Unhappy with the poor performance of their new acquisition ("You can't polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter." - Dilbert), the owners may sell Hex off again or even break it up and sell off chunks to other metrology companies eager to grab the huge amount of high-tech Intellectual Property that Hexagon had acquired on it's decades-long spending spree. Perhaps the highest bidder for the PC-DMIS cash cow is a competitor who puts a bullet in it's head, or a young energetic and highly incompetent new company who free-fall into insolvency and fail to maintain the software.

In any case, the bugs will go away eventually. All things must pass.

There are 'some' inaccuricies in that scenario...

Fun fact: the owner of Buggy Whips is my coworker!