CoCreate Software at $250 Million

Product lifecycle management software developer PTC plans to buy CoCreate Software for $250 million. PTC plans to broaden its portfolio of PLM and CAD (computer aided design) products to include an impressive suite of modeling tools that offer product development capabilities, like: engineering calculations, dynamic publishing, visualization, high-speed machining, and enterprise content and process management. PTC, of Needham, Mass., will integrate CoCreate’s modeling software into its Product Development System.

CoCreate Software logo

In addition to announcing the acquisition, PTC reported its fourth quarter 2007 revenue, up 9 percent for the same year-ago period, to $266.7 million, and full year revenues, up 10 percent from 2006, to $941.5 million. PTC said fourth-quarter license revenues grew 14 percent from the same year-ago period, to $96.1 million. Total license revenues for the fiscal year were $296.1 million, up 12 percent from 2006.

CoCreate has about 5,000 customers, including the likes of: Agilent, Canon, Fisher Controls, Fujitsu, Hewlett-Packard, Olympus, and NEC. CoCreate also has 280 employees and annual revenues of about $80 million.

PTC logo

PTC President and CEO C. Richard Harrison said in a statement: “As experts in product development, we are constantly evaluating technologies that address the business challenges of our customers. This acquisition is compelling as it enhances PTC’s product portfolio while also contributing in a meaningful way to earnings and operating margin. We are committed to protecting and enhancing the investment that these customers have made in CoCreate solutions and we plan to also offer additional complementary PTC solutions in order to bring them even more value.”

The CoCreate acquisition is another step in a rapidly consolidating PLM portfolio. In the last year and a half, Dassault bought MatrixOne, Siemens bought UGS and Oracle bought Agile Software. And while there is a boatload of smaller PLM vendors in the market, the major players have consolidated to three: PTC, UGS (itself a compilation of acquisitions) and Dassault. Now ERP (enterprise resource planning) giants SAP and Oracle are in the game, too, increasing competition even more.

Tags: CoCreate, PLM, software, CRM News, ERP, SAP, open source