Michael Lord

It is just a few weeks until SOLIDWORKS World 2016 in Dallas – Texas.  This will be my sixth SOLIDWORKS World and as each year rolls round I continue to look forward to attending the event. The last time that I and SOLIDWORKS World were in Texas was for SOLIDWORKS World 2011 – San Antonio -TX.   It was my first SOLIDWORKS World and one full of very fond memories. There is a back story to my attendance that year but I won’t bore you with the details here. If you are interested, you can find some details here

It was most memorable for many reasons.   First it was my FIRST SOLDWORKS World! That alone would have made it special.   It also provided the opportunity to meet many of the SOLIDWORKS Community that I had only known previously via Social media and the SOLIDWORKS Forum. Wonderful people now great friends and one of the main reasons why I enjoy returning to SOLIDWORKS World each year.

Of course I can’t ever mention SOLIDWORKS World 2011 without reflecting on the Keynote speaker.   As I have commented on many times over the years, as a child of the Apollo Space Mission era to see & hear Gene Kranz and Commander Capt. Jim Lovell recounting that era was awe-inspiring.   I have never sat in a room with 5000+ people, all, who listened with such intensity to hear these two gentlemen recount their stories.   I still can feel the silence from the room as everyone in there hung on to every word that was spoken.

Whilst I’m reminiscing I also recall the explosion of applause and cheers from an audience when hearing the delivered line “Would you like to see it fly?” It was Keynote speaker Elias Knubben – Festo – Bionic Projects from Day 2 of the General Session – SOLIDWORK World 2013 Orlando – Florida.   Well “Would you like to see it fly?”

As I stated at the time “That’s the way to end a General Session”

If that was a way to end a General Session then the Day 1 General Session – SOLIDWORKS World 2014 – San Diego was definitely a way to start one.   The appearance of the eatART Mondo Spider “walking” onto the stage in a sea of colour and sound certainly set the tone for the rest of the event.

But enough of looking back.  Over the past week SOLIDWORKS have started releasing a few details for SOLIDWORKS World 2016.  First was the announced of this year’s Keynote speakers on The SOLIDWORKS Blog.   The four Keynote speakers are:
Yves Behar, Designer – Yves Behar has produced some of the new millennium’s most coveted objects, like the Leaf lamp, the Jawbone headset, and the XO laptop for One Laptop per Child.

Peter Diamandis, Space Activist – Peter Diamandis runs the X PRIZE Foundation, which offers large cash incentives to inventors who can solve grand challenges, like space flight, low-cost mobile medical diagnostics, and oil spill cleanups.

David Pogue, Technology Columnist – David Pogue is the founder of Yahoo Tech having been groomed for the position by 13 years as the personal-technology columnist for the New York Times. In addition to being a tech correspondent for CBS News, he’s also one of the world’s bestselling how-to authors, with titles in the “For Dummies” series and his own line of “Missing Manual” books.

Neil Gershenfeld, Physicist, Personal Fab Pioneer – As Director of MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms, Neil Gershenfeld explores the boundaries between the digital and physical worlds.

While I’m not all that familiar with any of the speaker the same could have been said about Hugh Herr  – MIT Media Lab.  A Keynote speaker on Day 1 – SOLIDWORKS World 2014.  What a truly inspired presentation that turned out to be!

Also released on “The SOLIDWORKS Blog” was the announcement of Tuesday nights Special Event to be held at Gilley’s Dallas   As per previous Special Events at SOLIDWORKS World it looks to be an interesting and entertaining place!  Gilley’s also has the added bonus of just being just a short casual stroll (0.5miles/800m/3blocks) from the Convention Centre.  The fresh air on the way home will do us all good.If Gilley’s is half as good as the last time I attended a Special Event in Texas at Cowboys Dancehall – San Antonio then we are in for a great night.  In my defense as mentioned at the start of this post SOLIDWORKS World 2011 – San Antonio was my first and at the time I thought there was a very good chance that it might be my only.  So I did take advantage of all that  Cowboys Dancehall had to offer.   I now know that SOLIDWORKS World’s are endurance events and one really should be at ones best for the Wednesdays General Session.

Many think that Day 3 – Wednesday General Session is the most looked forward to.  As it normally has the much anticipated preview of the next years SOLIDWORKS  release.   It’s not just the highlighted features shown that makes this part of the event so anticipated but HOW it is presented which makes it a crowd favorite.  One can only wonder what the theme will be for  SOLIDWORKS 2017?

Whilst we wait for the start of SOLIDWORKS World 2016 lets speculate to what we might or might not see or hear this year!

The only thing I’m slightly confident about that we will see more about is SOLIDWORKS Visualize.  Announced at the launch of SOLIDWORKS 2016 and that it would be part of SOLIDWORKS Professional & Premium products.  It was said to be released with a future Service Pack.  I wouldn’t be surprised if SP2 wasn’t released in the week of SOLIDWORKS World 2016!  That might test out the wi-Fi in a few of the motels!

It was this time last year that we had (the shock?) announcement that Gian Paolo Bassi would be taking over as CEO at SOLIDWORKS.  At the time there was much speculation that we would see an increase in the development & promotion of the 3DExperience products of SOLIDWORKS Conceptual Designer and SOLIDWORKS Industrial Designer.    If anything the opposite has appear to happen as the year has gone by.  Both look to be very good products but it could be said to be restricted by access to Dassault Systemes own Server  There has been little or no information about the expansion of Dassault Systemes Server Network.  Which continues to see the products mainly for the North America and Europe markets.  Granted it would be their main markets!   It will be interested to see what is shown and talked about this year, of the 3DExperience products.

The opposite could be said for the SOLIDWORKS product.   After the much publicized and rumored “death” of SOLIDWORKS back in 2010 the only thing that has died is the “white noise chatter”.   The SOLIDWORKS product continues to see enhancement each year.   Although it has not been without it’s own controversy this year, with it’s new interface (and it’s new subscription policy).  For me, SOLIDWORKS 2016 has been a very good release and personally the more I use, the more I like the new Interface.   It will be interesting to see what is addressed at SOLIDWORKS World and more importantly what development and direction the product continues in.

Speculation is just that and I can’t wait to attend SOLIDWORKS World 2016 – Dallas TX and everything that in entails.

As always I’m particularly looking forward to catching up with a whole lot of friend and the many from the SOLIDWORKS Community.