NEWS: Autodesk Sued by Dealers for Breach of Contract, Fraud, Bad Faith

[ken]

Just goes to show you that buying a company and then discontinuing all it's
products is not the only business competitive strategy available for bloated
inefficient insensitive to customer relations software megacorporations.

Not that there are any associated with this ng :-)

Tony Tanzillo wrote:
>
> Autodesk(R), Inc. Sued by Two Dealers for Breach of Contract, Fraud, and Bad Faith
>
> Autodesk Seeks To Damage Dealers Who Sell Competitive Software
>
> SAN FRANCISCO, March 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Two former Autodesk, Inc. (Nasdaq: ADSK - news)
> dealers in California, US CAD Inc., of Irvine, and Digital Dimensions of San Diego, have
> brought lawsuits against Autodesk, the largest purveyor of computer aided design software
> systems. The two lawsuits accuse Autodesk of fraud and breach of contract in connection
> with the termination of the two dealers, both of whom had been dealers for over a decade.
> The complaints were filed in the Superior Court of Marin County, California, which is the
> site of Autodesk's headquarters.
>
> The two companies allege that Autodesk prevented them from selling the software of
> Autodesk competitors like SolidWorksŽ. The contracts between the dealers and Autodesk,
> however, had no such prohibition.
>
> US CAD and Digital Dimensions claim that the success of SolidWorks was the reason that
> Autodesk did not renew the dealer's contracts to sell AutoCAD and other Autodesk products.
> This non-renewal of their contract came after both dealers had performed as top Autodesk
> dealers for more than 12 years.
>
> ``Adding SolidWorks to our lineup of products was originally accepted by Autodesk. But
> when the SolidWorks product impacted the Mechanical Desktop sales, they demanded that we
> drop SolidWorks or suffer the consequences,'' said Bob Coan, Chief Executive of US CAD.
> The President of Digital Dimensions, Patrick Lindsay, added that he was never told that
> carrying a competitor product would lead to termination. ``If I had known that, I could
> have tried to deal with the situation constructively,'' he said, ``instead of being
> blindsided after 14 years as a loyal dealer.''
>
> According to Ronald S. Katz, a Coudert Brothers attorney representing both US CAD and
> Digital Dimensions, ``It is unlikely that Autodesk's misconduct is limited to just these
> two dealers. We have heard from other dealers who believe that Autodesk is trying, through
> this conduct, to monopolize certain of its markets.''
>
> US CAD and Digital Dimensions are leading edge providers of technical service for computer
> aided design software systems. Both companies have now branched out from Autodesk products
> to the products of other manufacturers like SolidWorks.
>
> SOURCE: US CAD Inc.
>
> --
> /*********************************************************/
> /* Tony Tanzillo Design Automation Consulting */
> /* Programming & Customization for AutoCAD & Compatibles */
> /* ----------------------------------------------------- */
> /* tony.t...@worldnet.att.net */
> /* http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/tonyt */
> /*********************************************************/

[Tony Tanzillo]

Autodesk(R), Inc. Sued by Two Dealers for Breach of Contract, Fraud, and Bad Faith

Autodesk Seeks To Damage Dealers Who Sell Competitive Software

SAN FRANCISCO, March 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Two former Autodesk, Inc. (Nasdaq: ADSK - news)
dealers in California, US CAD Inc., of Irvine, and Digital Dimensions of San Diego, have
brought lawsuits against Autodesk, the largest purveyor of computer aided design software
systems. The two lawsuits accuse Autodesk of fraud and breach of contract in connection
with the termination of the two dealers, both of whom had been dealers for over a decade.
The complaints were filed in the Superior Court of Marin County, California, which is the
site of Autodesk's headquarters.

The two companies allege that Autodesk prevented them from selling the software of

Autodesk competitors like SolidWorks®. The contracts between the dealers and Autodesk,

[Dave Hinrichs]

The dealer contract clearly states which products a dealer can or cannot
carry in addition to Autodesk products. We had to choose a few years ago
to stay with MDT or go with Solidworks. This crap about be blindsided is
nonsense. Many many products sold through dealers have requirements such
as this and more the dealers will lose.

The reason they do this we have a competitor that sells autocad and
solidworks. They constantly lie about what MDT can do. If I made a
product and sold it via a dealer channel I would not allow this either,
it is not evil or illegal, despite Mr. Tanzillo's wishes.

Tony Tanzillo wrote:
>
> Autodesk(R), Inc. Sued by Two Dealers for Breach of Contract, Fraud, and Bad Faith
>
> Autodesk Seeks To Damage Dealers Who Sell Competitive Software
>
> SAN FRANCISCO, March 24 /PRNewswire/ -- Two former Autodesk, Inc. (Nasdaq: ADSK - news)
> dealers in California, US CAD Inc., of Irvine, and Digital Dimensions of San Diego, have
> brought lawsuits against Autodesk, the largest purveyor of computer aided design software
> systems. The two lawsuits accuse Autodesk of fraud and breach of contract in connection
> with the termination of the two dealers, both of whom had been dealers for over a decade.
> The complaints were filed in the Superior Court of Marin County, California, which is the
> site of Autodesk's headquarters.
>
> The two companies allege that Autodesk prevented them from selling the software of

> Autodesk competitors like SolidWorksŽ. The contracts between the dealers and Autodesk,

--
***************************************************************
* Dave Hinrichs MCE\ACE\Certified Instructor *
* E-Mail.d...@quannon.com *
* Quannon CAD Systems, Inc. Voice: (612) 935-3367 *
* 6101 Baker Road, Suite 204 FAX: (612) 935-0409 *
* Minnetonka, MN 55345 *
* http://www.quannon.com/ *
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***************************************************************

[ken]

actually, Dave, this is a copy of a newswire story.
I don't think tony wrote it.

[Tony Tanzillo]

These dealers were selling SolidWorks for some time, and
Autodesk had no objections to it. After SolidWorks won a
few awards, proved to be clearly superior to MDT for 3D
Solid Modeling (but not necessarily 2D documentation), and
started to eat away at MDT sales, only then did Autodesk
take action against these dealers.

Autodesk is walking a very dangerous line. Many of the
actions they take could easily be used to demonstrate that
in-fact, they have the market power of a monopoly. If that
can be provden, it would not bode well for them, should
they ever find themsleves in a position similar to the one
that Microsoft is in.

Autodesk clearly abuses its market power, and that is what
must stop, one way or another.

Autodesk's actions have one ultimate ramification that no
one, including Autodesk customers should wish for, which is
less choice. Without choice, you are Autodesk's prisoner,
just as Autodesk resllers are prisoners now. And, like a
a prisoner, is exactly how they'll treat you.

[Tony Tanzillo]

Dave Hinrichs wrote:
>
> The reason they do this we have a competitor that sells autocad and
> solidworks. They constantly lie about what MDT can do. If I made a
> product and sold it via a dealer channel I would not allow this > either, it is not evil or illegal, despite Mr. Tanzillo's wishes.

If you want to talk about lying, how about we start
with Autodesk's?

They lied to customers about R14 backward compatibility.

They deliberately mislead customers W.R.T. AutoCAD R14
performance, relative to R12 DOS.

One of their dealers told a customer that he had better
purchase Architectural Desktop, because according to the
dealer, AutoCAD 2000 was the last version of the product
that would be available in a plain-vanilla version that
ran third-party applications, and because of that, AutoCAD
3rd party developers had 'no future'

And now, it looks like they are all geared up to pollute
the air with more bullshit concerning AutoCAD 2000, which
is not faster than R14 on every machine I've tested them
both on.

[Terry W. Dotson]

Tony Tanzillo wrote:

> One of their dealers told a customer that he had better
> purchase Architectural Desktop, because according to the
> dealer, AutoCAD 2000 was the last version of the product
> that would be available in a plain-vanilla version that
> ran third-party applications, and because of that, AutoCAD
> 3rd party developers had 'no future'

And on two occasions that I personally know of, Autodesk Resellers told potential clients that they "had better buy Land Development
Desktop because there won't be any future versions of vanilla AutoCAD, and the third party alternative HAS NO FUTURE".

Quite a coincidence that many Autodesk resellers are thinking up the exact same thing to say.

Terry

[Tony Tanzillo]

Terry - Are you telling us that two seperate and unrelated
dealers that do not know each other both told a potential
customer this ???????????

Uh oh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

--

[Doug Wietbrock]

Although I have no reason to doubt what you say, I wonder if the following
can be attributed to a single unethical or ill-informed Autodesk reseller
rather than to a villainous corporate marketing plan. While I have no
"inside scoop" from Autodesk, I question the business wisdom of killing off
their cash cow - plain vanilla AutoCAD. It appears to be a dangerous gamble
that has much more at risk than to reward.

If, on the other hand, Autodesk were to develop integrated vertical
applications that were clearly far superior to plain vanilla AutoCAD or to
any modular solution available from a third-party developer, the majority of
the market might move to these verticals. At that point I could see
justification to shorten the future for plain vanilla AutoCAD. Until that
happens, and I suspect that will be a while, I think the AutoCAD reseller
was selling with fear.

Who was it that said "Innovation will happen"? The corollary is "Innovation
will happen...elsewhere". That is why Microsoft and others buy technologies
that are innovative...from elsewhere. It represents a long-term threat. I
just cannot see the death of third-party developers. They are just too
clever, too nimble, too adept at seeing a need that others miss.

Just my thoughts. Your mileage may vary.

[Dave Hinrichs]

I couldn't agree more. If they wanted to kill the third party why do
they put in all those customization tools (lisp, VBA, ARX etc...)

--

[Terry W. Dotson]

Tony Tanzillo wrote:

> Terry - Are you telling us that two seperate and unrelated
> dealers that do not know each other both told a potential
> customer this ???????????

One in the Northeast and the other in the Rocky Mtn area.

Terry

[na]

I was told something similar in relation to Arch Desktop. I'm still trying
to adjust to the SHIFT... Not to impressed.
Robert

Terry W. Dotson wrote in message <37026462...@domain.com>...