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> used to be the case for specialist software

I think that's a great example of how a competitive market drives these costs to zero. When solid modeling software was new Pro/ENGINEER cost ~$100k/year. Today the much more capable PTC Creo costs $3-$30k depending on the features you want and SOLIDWORKS has full features down to $220/month or $10/month for non-professionals.

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Off-topic, but I work 'around' PTC software, and am surprised to see them mentioned. Got much knowledge in the area?

On-topic, yeah. PTC sells "Please Call Us" software that, in Windchill's example, is big and chunky enough to where people keep service contracts in place for the stuff. But, the cost is justifiable to companies when the Windchill software can "Just Do PLM", and make their job of designing real, physical products so much more effective, relative to not having PLM.

I only worked with it decades ago. At the time, the split between wages, software, and hardware was about equal. Then the computers became free, and the software has been getting cheaper all the time.

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