ANN ARBOR, Michigan, January 25, 2006—IBM and PTC today announced a non-exclusive relationship in which the two companies have established a cooperative market agreement to address specific markets. IBM and PTC will jointly market and sell solutions based on PTC’s suite of products, with a focus on their Windchill offerings. According to the announcement, this partnership will primarily address the emerging PLM market in China, but will also include programs in the US and Europe focused on targeted accounts within selected industries, including electronics, consumer packaged goods (CPG), and life sciences.
According to IBM, this relationship will be supported by a dedicated group within IBM that will be solely focused on driving the PTC partnership. IBM and PTC stressed that this new program is targeted at “enterprise” PLM opportunities, and is intended to provide PLM solutions integrated with ERP, CRM, SCM, and other enterprise-level initiatives based upon IBM’s middle-ware and infrastructure technologies. IBM’s services team is expected to provide the primary support for customer implementations.
It is clear that IBM has established a more substantive relationship with PTC than they have previously had with any PLM partner other than Dassault Systèmes (DS). IBM and PTC have worked together previously in selected accounts, in which IBM-BCS provided services to support implementation of PTC solutions. In addition, PTC’s On-Demand offering is hosted by IBM.
IBM reports that this is not a step away from their relationship with DS, who remains their strategic PLM partner. DS products will continue to be branded as IBM products, while PTC products sold through this relationship will remain branded by PTC. However, this agreement appears to be a move by IBM to segment industries and regions which are to be primarily supported by their various partners.
This IBM-PTC agreement does change IBM’s overall positioning in the PLM market. It establishes an environment in which IBM will be cooperating with a partner in some markets while competing with them in others. Conversely, IBM’s partners will be able to establish relationships with other services providers for those markets in which they are not collaborating with IBM.
This agreement is good news for PTC. It provides a further validation of their solution suite for enterprise-level implementations, and allows them to leverage IBM’s global presence in the electronics, CPG, and life sciences industries. Additionally, PTC can take advantage of IBM’s infrastructure technologies and strong PLM services resources to target large enterprises and an emerging market.
For IBM, this agreement provides an opportunity to offer alternative solutions, depending upon the industry and client. In addition, this expands their market opportunity and reinforces IBM’s position as a solutions supplier that selects their technology partners based upon a “best fit” approach for the client.
CIMdata believes that the IBM and PTC announcement is a significant event in the PLM industry, and impacts the competitive positioning of IBM and its PLM partners. For industrial companies, this agreement expands the availability of solutions that are uniquely targeted to their specific requirements.
In addition, the anticipated competition between IBM’s partners to deliver more substantive offerings should benefit customers and the overall PLM market.
