Jon Hirschtick at SW Corp HQ

When Jon Hirschtick talks, his excitement is infectious.  Maybe reason for this is that he is excited about what he’s talking about.  At the recent visit to SolidWorks headquarters, several of us SolidWorks bloggers got to met with Jon again, but it never seems like enough time.

He talked about how he likes to keep up on what’s going on in the world.  He’s always looking for new technologies that may be worked into a new feature within the SolidWorks business model (my wording).

One particular area he talked about again was that 3D modelling isn’t owned by the 3D CAD industry.  It is owned by the Gaming industry.  The guys in the Gaming industry are the ones working with unique motion control within huge 3D worlds. This is a point he also made at SolidWorks World 2009.

He also is trying to keep updated on hardware technologies that may be used on the side of CAD but within the CAD context.   Again, he pointed to the Gaming industry and such devices as the Wii and Xbox.  Jon seemed fascinated by the fact that his son rather voice talk to him via the Xbox instead of the traditional land-line or cellphone because it is easier, its better quality and more reliable. He also mentioned that “kids” do not voice talk much on their cellphones.  They rather text.  Voice is reserved for emergencies. It is fascinating that the methods of communication used by older generations is much different than what is now being used now by the newer generations.  This process of change is likely to continue.

One prediction that he made is that cellphones will all soon be equipped with a projector that will allow human interfacing within the projected image.