Walking the Walk

Scott Kirsner’s always-worth-reading column in The Boston Globe today describes how Parametric (now known as PTC) is attempting to become interesting again. In the late ’80s, it was an important player in the CAD market. And, with a market value of $2.2B and annual revenues of nearly $1B – that’s a lot of CAD! – it’s the largest standalone sw company in the Commonwealth of MA. Even so, it’s such a dull company that Mike Dukakis was kicked off of its board of directors because his crazy antics were too distracting. (Insert rim shot here.*) Now it’s trying to reinvigorate itself with a new line of software called Windchill that opens up the product design process to all concerned parties, from internal departments to external suppliers to customers. The software is already being adopted by such thrill-a-minute corporations as Airbus, EMC and Lockheed “Lewis and” Martin. Owners of PTC’s CAD software are averaging 14 licenses of Windchill for each CAD license. Product design is a conversation. Who’d a thought it! (Well, Doc Searls for one.)

CIO magazine has given a Web Business 50 award to the American Cancer Society for its bulletin boards and chat rooms. The boards are so important to users that the organization prominently displays the link to them on its home page. This looks like a great site.

Then there are those who take steps backwards. CIO also gave an award to K2, in part because of their cool user-to-user technical forum. Unfortunately, as the article notes, the forum is no longer up. Instead, the company has a set of technical manuals available. In PDF, to add insult to injury. (Oh, PDF is well-architected and a boon in some situations, but it is usually a dodge for companies that insist on putting their handsome looks ahead of their customers’ convenience and time.)

A reader whose name I’ve already lost, thus setting a new land speed record for forgetfulness, points us at Jones Soda where they do everything they can think of to get visitors involved. They’ll display your photos, they’ll publish your stories, they’ll even put your picture on a bottle of soda. On a quick look I didn’t see much that I actually cared about, but at least the gimmicks are customer-focused gimmicks. I guess that counts as progress.

Thanks
I got an encouraging note from Dominique. Her blog today tells a sorry tale of a show-me-your-tits job interview, a genre I thought we’d left behind us. Foolish me.