Hexagon AB already skirts the edges of AEC with its total stations, laser systems, and GPS systems technologies but now owns Bricsys’s formidable DWG-native CAD and BIM platforms, making Hexagon a new major player in the world of AEC software.
THIS JUST IN — Sweden’s Hexagon AB is acquiring Belgium’s Bricsys NV, making it now the largest technology company in the world (by revenue) engaged in the AEC industry with access to two critical technologies that dominate the world of AEC—BIM technologies and a powerful and native DWG AutoCAD clone known as BricsCAD.
The announcement was just made less than an hour ago at Bricsys 2018, its worldwide developer and user conference taking place in London this week.
Who is Hexagon and What Does This Mean?
Architosh has already been covering the rising upstart in the BIM world, Bricsys NV of Belgium, for years. A founding member of the Open Design Alliance (ODA), they have become a world-leader in powerful DWG CAD technologies and expanding via an array of CAD and BIM technology solutions that directly challenge US-based Autodesk as well as rival CAD and BIM industry players in the non-DWG world.
Being a smaller company, relative to its competitors, and being in Europe, one of the inevitable challenges in growing its brand and user base has been its lack of US-based offices and worldwide marketing firepower.
Sweden’s Hexagon AB (styled HEXAGON) is a massive company with revenues of over EUR 3.5 billion and nearly 20,000 employees globally. 17 percent of its employees are engaged in research and development (R&D). Its tagline at the present is “manufacturing intelligence” and the company sells computer-aided engineering (CAE) software with solutions touching on finite element analysis (FEA) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD).
Architosh has spoken over the years to at least one major CAD industry executive who mentioned Hexagon’s existence and potential to one day enter the AEC industry and disrupt it. That day has come today.