Eric Bouwer’s slight Dutch accent is the first thing you notice that sets him apart from your typical Midwest executive. Great success with international IT companies further distinguishes this tall and easy-going man, who since July 2002 has been CEO of Cyco, the company that more AutoCAD users depend on for EDM than any other.
Like any CEO, Bouwer would like to expand his domain. Although he doesn’t happen to know his market share, he is certain he’d like to expand it. Bouwer's weapon of choice to take on his competition is a product still on the drawing table - so to speak - something called a BOM (Bill of Materials) Module. The BOM Module works with Cyco’s market-leading AM Meridian electronic document manager (EDM) and promises to manage the bill of materials.
Bouwer was kind enough to answer 10 questions for
CADdigest recently.
1. First, Cyco bills itself as an EDM (electronic document management) company rather than a PDM (product data management) company. Would you explain the difference?
Generally PDM companies focus on the broader issues for an organization. They try to integrate a complete solution that encompasses production, engineering, accounting, etc., and include everyone in the project. This makes the project very time consuming and costly for the customer.
We focus on managing the data produced by engineering and ensure our solutions interface with existing applications or ERP systems in use at the company. We integrate the engineering department to the rest of the business organization.
2. CAD appears to have saturated the market. It seems that everyone who is going to buy a CAD system has already bought one. This is in contrast to EDM. Would you agree that most CAD users don’t even know they need an EDM system?
Yes, that’s correct. Many organizations are unaware of their data management issues and the impact on the rest of the organization. A proper data management solution allows engineering to easily integrate their work with other departments that may be impacted such as purchasing, inventory control, and billing.
For example, our new Bill of Materials (BOM) Module allows companies to recover costs associated with manual re-entry of BOM specifications from engineering by automating the process and making it accessible. Companies can easily determine the return on their investment by eliminating errors typically caused by having multiple BOM’s in existence for the same project. Depending on the size and scope of the company, most will recover their investment in 3 to 18 months.
3. How does Cyco propose educating the potential EDM customer on the benefits to EDM?
Initially, by focusing our efforts to ensure that our sales and marketing departments are focused on meeting our customers’ needs and by demonstrating the benefits of engineering data management solutions through our sales materials, website, web casts, and training sessions.
Secondly, by assisting our resellers through their sales process by being more involved in showing value to their customers.
4. There are many EDM packages. In fact, 78 are listed on the TenLinks EDM/PDM directory. What distinguishes the Cyco product from the others?
Generally, other products focus on archiving data. We focus on the workflow and history involved during the engineering process. More importantly, we are vendor-neutral and integrate with all the CAD systems on the market such as AutoCAD, SolidWorks and MicroStation. Our solutions allow companies to work with all the CAD products they have in use as very few companies use only one. In addition, we integrate with other applications or database solutions in use at the company allowing our solutions to be effectively used throughout the company, not just by the designers/engineers.
5. How does Cyco break down the market for EDM, and what segment of the market does it address?
CAD is the market where our dealer channel has traditionally been focused as it complements their CAD business and we continue to develop solutions for this marketplace.
We are focusing efforts on developing what we call the Manufacturing or Engineering-to-Order (ETO) market. These are companies that might have a standard product they make but must customize it to meet individual customer specifications. For example, one of our customers makes 747 jets. It’s the same plane and involves similar drawings and specifications, however, the final product must be customized for each airline or location. There are about 17,000 ETO companies in the United States and Europe alone so we are focused on growing this market. Our first product offering specifically for this space is the BOM Module because it has been a critical need for them. Customers can easily re-use the standard specifications and customize them where necessary, and it works seamlessly with their Cyco AutoManager Meridian solution.
Our emerging markets are the Asset and Facilities Management markets. Asset managers need to manage and maintain assets such as buildings or technical plants and be able to easily access the necessary drawings and specifications needed to control and run the plants. Our partner for this space is MRO Software, which provides the maintenance solution that integrates with Cyco AutoManager Meridian. Our facilities management partner is ARCHIBUS and we focus on organizations that are the ‘building owners’ with multiple locations with people and equipment that must be planned and maintained for each location. For example, a bank that needs to move people and equipment between locations.
6. What is the problem that the Bill of Materials Module is trying to solve?
Many companies find it difficult to integrate engineering with the rest of the organization. A company might have a CAD system that produces a BOM but it is incomplete and only accessible by the engineers. This involves either manually re-keying the information or sending documents around the company. Typical organizations enter the BOM information at least twice, resulting in keying errors and delays because everyone involved is not always working with the same BOM. Our Cyco AutoManager BOM Module automates the information that comes from engineering, makes it easily available to other departments, provides revision control and ensures there is just one current BOM in existence. This is critical for most companies as it allows them to save costs, reduce production delays, and get product to market quicker.
[A white paper (in pdf) explains this module in greater detail.]
7. What will be the availability and price of the BOM?
The Cyco AutoManager BOM Module is available for demo and purchase now with ship dates beginning October 31. Pricing starts at $249 per seat for the Logistics/Non-engineer interface for those departments that need to access the data but not the drawings. The Engineering/Designer interface retails in the $500 range but we encourage customers to either contact their resellers for exact pricing as volume discounts are also in effect, or go to our website at www.cyco.com to find a reseller.
8. Cyco and Autodesk are tight at the moment. In the past, however, Autodesk has acted like an unruly giant. It has tried to launch products competitive with AM Meridian (the now defunct WorkCenter and Motiva, for example). Autodesk also has a history of acquiring a company and alienating partners with similar products. Do these things keep you up at night?
No. Autodesk is a great partner whose core business is CAD. We know this market and our customers know that we focus on data management solutions that integrate engineering to the rest of the company. Our solutions allow our customers to easily integrate Cyco AutoManager Meridian with their Autodesk CAD solutions and others they might be using.
9. Does Cyco plan on acquisitions to increase market share?
We don’t rule out anything that aids our growth, but that isn’t our primary focus right now.
10. What about an acquisition of Cyco by another company? In the MCAD space, Dassault Systemes bought SolidWorks to complement its own high-end MCAD system (CATIA). Could it do the same to complement its high-end EDM product (SMARTEAM)?
Right now we are focused on executing our product and sales strategies to grow our manufacturing and assets/facilities business. Growing our core business keeps me too busy to worry about what other companies may try to do.
Generally PDM companies focus on the broader issues for an organization. They try to integrate a complete solution that encompasses production, engineering, accounting, etc., and include everyone in the project. This makes the project very time consuming and costly for the customer. 
