www.si-community.com

Autodesk is to lay off 13% of its workforce, or around 1,150 jobs in total, as the company continues its transition from sales of perpetual software licences to a rental-only model.

The job cuts – the company’s second major sets of layoffs in under two years – are expected to come through a combination of a reduction in global sales staff and the cancellation of R&D projects.

http://www.cgchannel.com/2017/11/autode ... workforce/


Not very good news at all - I wonder if (and how) it will affect the development of Maya and Max

(and what soft will get axed... Mudbox?)

Not 3DSMax imho, as it still has more users than Maya.

Mudbox just got a promise for new development (the future is bright...), so one could speculate on that one.
But with all the losses over the last quarters, AD isn't really in a good spot. Trimming more fat might be just the second round here.

Looking at a smaller company like SideFX and their fierce pace of excellent releases, I find it just sad to see Maya just stumbling along with every new version.
And having nightly builds of your application is just awesome.

any chance they'd sell off softimage and someone good will pick it up and save it?

sigh..

couldn't happen to a 'nicer' company.

considering they said they want to reinvest in mudbox development, maybe they will shut down max and maya and focus on reinvesting in Softimage, thats the only way they can save the company

Hehe. Well i think most of these companies grow a big bureaucracy. People that code suddenly are a very small minority in a sea of sellers, middle managers for this and that, etc.

Also keep in mind that when they hire that is not news, so we have a biased view.

And yet they keep increasing their prices, and don’t give me the option of keep using Softimage in subscription...

This could be just another sorry attempt at increasing profits. Don't get me wrong, I'm a pro free-market capitalist, so I don't dis the chase for profit, just the approach of some companies to achieving it. If the layoffs consist of developers, it's going to be their downfall. Otherwise, if it's "economists", "HR sociologists" and "sales people" that were part of their huge bureaucracy, they're probably doing the right thing. Ultimately the info is scant, so much so that I can't decide whether to applaud or boo this piece of news.

Autodesk (and their competitors) have been investing heavily in cloud over a multi year transition and now they're hoping to enter a growth phase (as their statement suggests).
They probably staffed up heavily to do that in order to changed their systems and they also introduced alot of product at different levels to drive and attract subscribers. While that was all not doubt good for them, they might have bloated too much so they're looking to trim off some fat that they can't sustain whilst also cleaning up a complex folio of product. They've retired alot of the early could stuff such as the 123d products and earlier this year they announced they wouldstop selling their games middleware. Wouldn't surprise me if they also look at retire some more product too.
I know some poeple who have been affected but they weren't dev.

I have now doubt AD will bounce back from the expected post rental-only dip, as to a large extent are users had by the **alls.

At least in M&E (or other segments no doubt) not by mere circumstance,
or by driving customer recurrence though just innovation,
but through leveraging status for competition elimination 
 (ALL the main 3 pro VFX solutions ended-up under the same company),
and making customers take it  (along with all sorts of things that otherwise would never pass),  or leave it.

Where is the healthy competition?  There isn't any, there is unhealthy monopoly.

You can choose Cinema 4D, Houdini even Blender.

why? I already spent years trying to learn softimage. i don't have the patience to start another program from scratch

I was answering FXDude anyway if you want to stay in Softimage it is your call. But Softimage has no 3D tracking(matchmoving) , scene reconstruction, can it work with substances? , VDB, OpenSubD for some work it is still top , but for other is lacking.

I think there is a combination of things going on at Autodesk at the moment that are impacting their bottom line. Purchase and investment into new area such a cloud and the move to rental is only a portion of the problem. The Intertainment industry is in transition at the moment due to the lack of revenue at the box office and projects are being cancelled or delayed. That is going on also on the Engineering side due to the uncertainty of the economy. I think there is also dissatisfaction form customers as well and they are not buying rental to show there dissatisfaction. The situation may resolve itself soon or stagnate. Hard to predict at the moment. Autodesk is putting up a brave face but news of lay-off does not shine a bright light on their situation

I hope rental goes the way of the dodo.

It's an extremely lazy way to earn revenue and they know it.

Rental onnly makes sense for long term high priced products. things like photo shop at $550's a buy or so, not so much.

Moving away from a reseller model to one where people buy from you directly from the webstore means a lot of changes in the people you need. They're doing fine with their rental plan; revenu from rental was $940M and doubled in 12 months. (It's the first full-year of rental.) Their portfolio has also accumulated hundreds of products in the previous years, so lots of people working on weird stuff that nobody uses, and cuts were to be expected.

Autodesk isn't quite there yet: 45% of its $515.3 million in Q3 revenues derived from subscriptions, though that's up significantly from 23% in the prior-year Q3. Meanwhile, Autodesk's traditional license revenues have been faltering as it convinces clients to move to subscription, which has caused a total top-line decline for several quarters - until Q3. Though Autodesk's 5% y/y growth rate this quarter is minuscule, it shows that the company is climbing from the bottom of the trough that it inflicted upon itself in its decision to switch to subscriptions.

source

https://seekingalpha.com/article/412933 ... e-discount

Share on 28 Nov was $130.76, shares on 5 Dec $106.88 a drop of approximately 20%. Care to buy some shares?