Renesas to buy Altium

[nctnico]

It was a great example of a tool that does just one job really well - the reason I bought it in the first place is that it had clearly been written from scratch using Windows conventions, and not inheriting stuff from old tools that had roots in DOS days.

I'm not sure Windows-isms (or GUI-isms) in general are always a good thing. In my workflow I never place elements which need to be placed accurate using a mouse. I always enter coordinates. As Allegro stems from a typical Unix / AutoCAD workflow, it has a command line. So I can enter 'x 5.423 1.234' to place an element at exactly that location (and continue with the next element when drawing a shape outline for example). In Altium you have to press CTRL-l after which a popup appears in which you can enter coordinates. The latter is rather cumbersome because you have to alternate between keyboard and mouse; it is more work.

[mikeselectricstuff]

It was a great example of a tool that does just one job really well - the reason I bought it in the first place is that it had clearly been written from scratch using Windows conventions, and not inheriting stuff from old tools that had roots in DOS days.

I'm not sure Windows-isms (or GUI-isms) in general are always a good thing.

Maybe not for some specific situations, but for new users, it is always a bad thing when software uses an unconventional approach for no  reason other than some arbitary decision taken years or decades ago before Windows was a thing.
When I first evaluated Accel as it was known then, it was running on Win95, and it was the only package that was sufficiently intuitive that a Windows user  could do useful work after a few hours' experimenting.

[temperance]

They should have buried AD in a very deep hole after they bought PCAD. Instead they continued working on their own garbage. They didn't even look at the code in PCAD which unlike AD does work. Because if they would have, push and shove routing, polygon pours and many other things would not be such a disaster.

If you can’t beat them, buy them.

[GreggD]

Altium stock chart and news stories.
Still trading today.
Some analysts had it rated as a sell.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/ALU.AX/

[EEVblog]

Altium stock chart and news stories.
Still trading today.
Some analysts had it rated as a sell.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/ALU.AX/

Just a formality really. Shares can be compulsorily acquired once they have bought enough to meet the threshold. The bank that is part of the loan arrangement for Renesas has been buying shares for months.

[Ice-Tea]

Reps still caling me to get back on subscription. Essentially asking me "what it would take". Told her I would never upgrade as long as the standard tier is site locked. Her reaction: "wuh?". When I explained she was rather worried for other folks she already sold the "upgrade" to.

So she's checking with "the technical people".

 

[SiliconWizard]

So what's the next acquistion?
Intel buying Microchip? That would be a good one.

[EEVblog]

So what's the next acquistion?
Intel buying Microchip? That would be a good one.

Intel just spun out Altera 

[NF6X]

So what's the next acquistion?
Intel buying Microchip? That would be a good one.

Intel just spun out Altera 

Oooh, maybe they want to borrow Atmel (via Microchip) next!

[SiliconWizard]

Yes, they're betting all on AI now, for sure that will save both Intel and the planet!
https://www.wired.com/story/intel-ceo-pat-gelsinger-ai-comeback/

[nctnico]

So what's the next acquistion?
Intel buying Microchip? That would be a good one.

Intel just spun out Altera 

I missed that news until now but it is hardly surprising.

[tszaboo]

Reps still caling me to get back on subscription. Essentially asking me "what it would take". Told her I would never upgrade as long as the standard tier is site locked. Her reaction: "wuh?". When I explained she was rather worried for other folks she already sold the "upgrade" to.

So she's checking with "the technical people".

 

Single site sounds like a very outdated model. By reading through the EULA, you cannot use it for working from home, you would need the continental license for it, that's a lot more expensive. Only to be able to use it on the same laptop from home. Altium, change the EULA please, this isn't 2018 anymore.

[Ice-Tea]

Can you imagine? Caving in after the 20th call from a rep, shelling out for the subscription renewal, comming home; opening your laptop to get some more work done and... nothing. 

[brumbarchris]

Well, just as a fun fact, the Renesas takeover starts to make itself felt. I have had some very old post on the Altium Forum being revived and answered (asking for more information) by a ...Renesas company representative!

Regards,
Cristian

[Sal Ammoniac]

Renesas completed its acquisition of Altium today. It'll be interesting to see what, if anything, changes at both companies.

[EEVblog]

Renesas completed its acquisition of Altium today. It'll be interesting to see what, if anything, changes at both companies.

Yep, there it is.

[SiliconWizard]

Wondering how many employees are getting fired after this acquisition.

[johnboxall]

Well, just as a fun fact, the Renesas takeover starts to make itself felt. I have had some very old post on the Altium Forum being revived and answered (asking for more information) by a ...Renesas company representative!

Regards,
Cristian

Hopefully Altium deals with people in a more... Japanese, customer-centric approach in the future. Bring on the omotenashi.

[mk_]

Chris and I yapping on for an hour about the acquisition:
https://theamphour.com/659-altium-acquired/

WTF!  No PCAD love in the history?  
(Altium killed my favorite layout software ...)

I still use PCAD2006 every day. Fortunately later Windows versions haven't broken it and it's extremely stable.
I've had it since it was called Accel ( formerly Tango).
You can in principle import PCAD to Altium, though it took my customer a couple of days to fix up a complex board with blind vias to be useable in Altium.

Well... still running PCAD2006 daily too, the only thing I`m missing is some kind of 3D-exporting into other tools. Anyway, Pulsonix reads PCAD-files  without problems.

[Sal Ammoniac]

Wondering how many employees are getting fired after this acquisition.

I would expect the number to be low, since there isn't much, if any, overlap in product lines. Perhaps it will be restricted to infrastructure positions like administration and the like.

[nctnico]

I'm wondering how long it will take before Altium is spun out again and sold to Cadence for a quarter of what Altium is worth now.

[thm_w]

Wondering how many employees are getting fired after this acquisition.

I would expect the number to be low, since there isn't much, if any, overlap in product lines. Perhaps it will be restricted to infrastructure positions like administration and the like.

Plenty of overlap can be claimed in stuff like finance, HR, marketing, support, etc. if they wanted to cut they can make huge cuts. Of course it wouldn't make sense to do it in terms of quality.

[rsjsouza]

I'm wondering how long it will take before Altium is spun out again and sold to Cadence for a quarter of what Altium is worth now.

I don't know about a Cadence buyout, but my guess is 3-5 years for a complete spinoff or they pull an Altera/Intel move and do a "soft spinoff"...

[free_electron]

I'm wondering how long it will take before Altium is spun out again and sold to Cadence for a quarter of what Altium is worth now.

Never. Cadence doesn't want Altium users. Different market. They don't want to handle this volume of users. Cadence lives off 100 users with multimillion dollar installs ( so to speak). Altium lives of 10.000 users with 10.000$ installs. Most cadence users do so as part of a larger package with the IC design tools. Buy Opus/Dracula/Concept and get Allegro free.

[tszaboo]

I'm wondering how long it will take before Altium is spun out again and sold to Cadence for a quarter of what Altium is worth now.

It's a Japanese company. They will happily own completely different industries. I worked long time ago at a company, that was a concrete manufacturer. Because concrete is moved by ships, they bought a ship manufacturer. And I was in the EMS section, that was manufacturing PCBAs for industrial washing machines, and JVC car radios. It doesn't have to make sense.