History
PTC was founded in 1985, by Samuel Peisakhovich Geisberg, who previously worked at Prime Computer, Computervision (CV) and Applicon. Pro/ENGINEER (a.k.a. Pro/E), the company's first product, shipped in 1988. John Deere became PTC's first customer.
Once an initial version of Pro/ENGINEER was developed, the company received venture capital funding from Charles River Associates and Steve Walske became the CEO. Pro/ENGINEER was the first commercially successful parametric feature based solid modeler. Through a combination of innovative technology, and no-holds-barred sales tactics, PTC quickly became a major force in the CAD industry. Its strong ascent continued unabated until the mid-1990s, when the introduction of Microsoft Windows NT, and the availability of commercial geometric modeling libraries opened the door to a new generation of low-cost competitors and PTC's reputation for overly aggressive sales tactics alienated many of its customers. These competitors, symbolized by Solidworks, squeezed PTC from the bottom, while more established companies like Unigraphics and IBM held the 'high ground' in automotive and aerospace industries. PTC's sales began a multi-year decline from which it took years to recover. It took a new CAD product (Pro/ENGINEER Wildfire) and an expanded product line, but PTC has been able to transform itself over the past 10 years into the third largest provider of Product Lifecycle Management software.
On December 29, 2006 Standard & Poor's bumped PTC off its S&P 500 Index, and replaced it instead with the newly spun off natural gas company Spectra Energy Corp. (NYSE: SE). Parametric then bumped Pier 1 Imports Inc. (NYSE: PIR), a retailer of home furnishings, down one spot and off the bottom of the S&P MidCap 400 Index. In 2008, PTC once again achieved revenues of over $1 billion, something it had not been able to accomplish since 1999.
Read more about this topic: Parametric Technology Corporation
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