Tribute to Seemage (acquired yesterday by Dassault Systemes)

Yesterday, Dassault systemes announced the acquisition of Seemage, a young French ISV, incepted in 2002 by Eric Piccuezzu, in Sophia. The company operates in the PLM/3D interactive product documentation space. Eric, a talented software developer, wanted his product to become the “PDF of the CAD industry”. That’s a vision.

In order to focus on the product & R&D, he had the extreme intelligence to hire two top guns from the PLM space Bruno Delahaye (in the middle), and Chris Williams (on the right), Chris was appointed as CEO, Bruno as VP Sales WWDE.  WWDE is important because Seemage generates most of their revenues out of France. It’s a pure global ISV.

I had the chance to collaborate with them during the last 18 months, we developed a strong technical and marketing partnership through the IDEES program (The picture above was taken during an EMEA innovation Event, where Seemage presented to the European press & Billg, the new release of their product on Vista & Office 07.   They did great things with OOXML.

During the last months, the company was on the VERY FAST TRACK, signing customers all around the world, raising money (Techfund, Sophia EuroLab, Primaveris), signing key partnerships… If one company deserved its success, it’s Seemage. They are HARDCORE professionals.

I do really consider that Microsoft ’s mission is to help guys like Eric, Bruno and Chris (the ones who build innovative stuff on our platform) to concretize their vision. I might be wrong, but i believe that’s what happened with Seemage. And they brought a lot of value to our customers.

Obviously, Eric’s vision was shared by Bernard Charles and his development team at DS since they decided to acquire the company, after a long bidding war with another PLM global player. I heard Mr. Charles was personally involved in the deal, and is now a strong fan of the Seemage Product.

The good news is that Eric and his team will be on a full throttle mode, with a strong capacity to invest and sell around the world.  I guess Eric (who always claimed the French Assedic was its most important VC) must be very proud, and excited by the future. The Seemage story is a pure software/entrepreneurship success-story, by the books.

Dassault Systemes demonstrates, once again, its ability to identify and acquire strategic technologies, IP and team.  It’s definitely a model for the rest of the industry.