Clarity on PLM

What I learned this week … was sparked by a conversation with a friend from the industry over a drink last night. We were discussing the cloud, PLM, multitouch, and IT in general. To be fair, there were other topics of conversation, but he is one of the people that I really respect for his insight into technology. We were discussing my thoughts on PLM in the Cloud, when it finally struck me. Are we going to ruin the design process for experienced engineers by hampering their real-time interaction with the system? Are we heading in the right direction for tomorrow’s engineers?

What Am I Talking About?

Work with me for a minute, this conversation was after only one beer so I think it makes a lot of sense. We were talking about what kids today will expect in the user interface of the future. We were talking about how our kids talk on their headsets and use their game controllers so naturally, doing things we don’t even understand. They are pushing combinations and series of buttons in rapid succession to make things happen in their game – in their virtual world. Then it struck me – why am I so excited about multi-touch and user interfaces that help replicate the real world? Isn’t the whole point of using a computer to go beyond what you can do manually? To super-enable your abilities?

OK, back to CAD and PLM.  Multitouch, 3D manipulation, and motion interfaces are cool. We all saw Iron Man, and we have seen demonstrations of multi-touch CAD. Now I am asking “so what?” OK, I love multitouch (and I want an iPad). But I have a tablet PC with a touch-sensitive screen, and how often do I pull my hands off of the keyboard to touch the screen (hint, no fingerprints on it)? I don’t even like to take my fingers off of the keyboard to grab the mouse, so I have learned a lot of shortcut keys and typeahead tricks. Why? I don’t want to replicate getting a blank piece of paper out of my desk, writing a report on it, making copies, manually distribute it to colleagues for review, and then file it in a file cabinet. The real world is much less efficient than my virtual computer world, so why replicate it in my user interface? OK, we all know the answer. It reduces the learning curve, and it makes interaction more intuitive. But for the experienced user I am going to call that assumption into question (translate as you will).

For the experience user – particularly for the people that grew up using Xbox controllers to manipulate their virtual world in ways they can’t dream of interacting in the real world – we need to do better. Don’t make them touch the screen, take advantage of the fact that they have ten fingers that can all act independently. Give them a motion-sensitive Wii/Xbox-type of controller that they can do ten things at a time with. Track their eye motion. Read their brain waves. The point is to most effectively translate and extend the ideas in the designer’s mind to the system. For the first-time user, multi-touch makes sense. For marketing presentations, the same. For a  day-to-day, interactive interface between an engineer’s fast-moving brain and their high-powered computing equipment it has to be fast and efficient for the experienced user – and that doesn’t necessarily mean natural or intuitive. Particularly when the definition of “intuitive” changes as more of the Xbox generation is sitting in front of the CAD system.

What Does This Have to do with The Cloud?

OK, if you are still with me I appreciate it. I know this has gotten long, and I haven’t even touched on the cloud yet. I will make this brief. I pointed out two types of concerns in my post on PLM and the cloud. One set of concerns was corporate, the other was performance for the user. Let’s relate the concepts above to the real-time performance of an engineer. A lot of the buzz around CAD in the cloud has discussed the challenge of rendering graphics rapidly and getting them back to the engineer. That is a big concern, and I have seen in posts like Josh Ming’s post on SolidSmack about SolidWorks on the cloud that progress is being made.

But what about input performance?  If the goal is to make the human-machine interface as efficient as possible and not distract the engineer from innovating, there can’t be a lag between action and reaction. Part of that lag time is computing/rendering responses. The other is capturing what they are doing. This is where I get concerned about lag times in the cloud. Maybe I need to look back at my son’s Xbox experience and just get over it? But I still have a lingering concern about maintaining real-time user-machine interfaces through the Cloud. I know a lot can be done client-side on the PC or workstation, but I still have to wonder if we are heading the right direction for the real design jocks. Maybe it is too much to ask engineers to learn that level of interaction with their systems, but won’t the Xbox-controller-wielding generation expect that, and won’t it be intuitive to them? If X-A-B-Y-LR-LR-X means pass the football in their game, why couldn’t they learn that means create a thumbnail of my 3D model and check it into the PLM system? Then, I am confident that powerful computing infrastructure (in the cloud or elsewhere) can execute on that.

Implications for Manufacturers

I realize that I may not have given you much that is actionable today, so I will leave you with a thought or two to ponder. All of the new UI ideas are cool, and there are huge benefits for companies to move applications to the cloud. But try before you buy. In your environment. With your infrastructure. And your people. And keep the capabilities of bright, highly talented, gaming savvy, trained, dedicated engineers in mind as you evaluate future user interfaces. Multitouch will have great uses in engineering software, and cloud computing has great promise. But let’s be careful what we ask for so we don’t hamper our future innovators. And for goodness sake, let’s make sure we don’t make them put their hands on the screen unless it is really helping them do something more natural (like sketching) that they can’t do better with an Xbox controller.

So those are my (somewhat random) thoughts, I hope you found them interesting. Do you agree? I didn’t, if you did let us know about it.

I had the chance to talk with … Sustainable Minds CEO Terry Swack late last year about their entry into the software world. The company introduced their on demand, green product design software to help manufacturers develop greener products. Sustainable Minds is furthering their ecodesign services by offering companies the ability to measure – and reduce – the environmental impact of their products early in the product lifecycle.

What do they Do?

The key to what Sustainable Minds offers is the ability to help companies make design trade-offs based on objective impact critera. Their product, Lifecycle Analyzer (LCA), allows companies to take a holistic look at the way their products affect our planet, including the energy used to produce it, logistics impact, energy to operate in use, packaging, and consummables. Their methodology, “Okala,” includes “impact factors” that allow designers to compare different options in systematic, repeatable, measurable way. I was impressed that the methodology is based on sound science and data from sources such as the EPA, giving the impact factors credibility. Okala is a single figure scoring system that includes 10 impact categories, over 550 impact factors, and CO2 equivalent values. Although there is no way to truly estimate how “green” a product is, the methodology and software provide a logical way to compare options in a meaningful way.

What do they Offer?

The LCA solution is made to work in conjunction with other solutions like CAD and PLM. For example, it can import a bill of material (BOM) from a CAD system to help engineers understand how “green” their products will perform. By wrapping LCA into the new product development (NPD) process, companies have the opportunity to make environmentally-friendly decision when they still have the flexibility to make decisions that won’t adversely impact product performance or cost, changing “green” from an afterthought to a design parameter that can be tracked.

Sustinable Minds also offers a Learning Center and a community to help companies adopt ecodesign strategies. They also leverage a database with impact factors and offer a process as well as tool. While most companies struggle today with just a process, this broad offering provides a way for companies to get started and makes analyzing design impacts realistically achievable.

Who do they Work With?

LCA is an early product, and Sustainable Minds has been running successful beta pilots. The goal is to work with manufacturers, consultants, and education to promote ecodesign. The company plans to roll out 12 industry modules, so they are thinking very big.

So that’s what I hear from Sustainable Minds, I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them?

A quick peek into some research on … the priorities, plans, views, and economic outlooks of companies that use engineering software. The survey-based study, published last night by Cyon Research, paints a very interesting picture of how manufacturers plan to invest and leverage engineering software (and related hardware) in the near future. I have had the opportunity to review and comment on the report during its development, and one thing that continuously struck me is not just how useful the published insights on the future of engineering software are, but the richness and depth of the information that the Cyon team couldn’t fit into the report.

The Research

The research spanned companies that use CAD, PLM, CAE, and other technical software, and included responses from almost 600 people. The report breaks down into a number of major categories, including:

• Purchasing plans, policies, and priorities
• Hardware refresh rate
• Financial outlook
• How companies differentiate themselves
• Engineering software selection criteria
• Views and plans on new releases from major software vendors (Dassault, Autodesk, Siemens)

In addition there are some interesting portions on who controls the BOM (and age-old question) and some insight into the relationship between CAE application usage and other engineering software used. The report contains a tremendous amount of information, with a number of very interesting charts. Plan to spend some time reading it if you have the opportunity, there is a lot to dig into.

Key Takeaways

There is far too much for me to give justice to in this space, but I will try to point out some of the more interesting things I learned from the report:

• Some companies have cut spending on engineering software – 29% of respondents indicated that they cut spending in the first half of 2009, with further cuts expected but at a slowing pace (for example 19% in first half of 2010). Note that these are likely in addition to cuts made in earlier budgets, so the total number that have reduced budgets from 2008 levels is probably higher.

• Many companies are playing “wait and see” -  42% are “considering or about to cut” spending if their business conditions worsen. This is what Cyon calls the “overhang” of the cuts, which includes the potential for further reductions dependent on the general economic conditions.

• Companies are planning to pick up spending (when they can) – in the words of the report, “The bright spot here is the longer-term outlook, 2010 and 2011, for increased spending in the purchases of design, analysis, and data management software.”

• Companies still have an appetite for improved solutions – the report gives details on the planned adoption of new technologies (V6 from Dassault Systemes, Inventor Fusion from Autodesk, and Sychronous Technology from Siemens PLM). I can’t share specifics, but across the board there are plans to implement the new solutions, although more Autodesk users say it is “too early to tell” given the maturity of the solution at this point.

Implications for Manufacturers

There are some valuable insights for manufacturers in this report to compare their strategies with their peers and competitors. The report provides some interesting detail on specific industries and their behavior, particularly on how each industry reported they plan to compete (product quality was the most commonly targeted differentiator overall, but this varied widely by industry).

I think this report is potentially even more valuable for software vendors.  The research gives them insight into what is important to their customers, and how they are planning to spend their money. For software companies, this can provide them with invaluable input into where they should focus their efforts to best serve their customers, particularly at a time when many are considering reductions in spending.

So that was a quick peek into some recent research on the viewpoint from engineering software users, I hope you found it interesting. Does the research reflect reality? Do you see it differently? Let us know what it looks like from your perspective.

I had the chance to talk with … Razorleaf during a research project earlier this year. Razorleaf helps manufacturers leverage PLM, Design Automation, and other enterprise technologies to improve product development and engineering processes. During the conversation, it was clear that they really understand how enterprise technology can be applied in an engineering environment. They are ready to step in and deliver the enterprise services required to implement PLM. But how much of the “PLM” ecosystem is really ready and capable to implement PLM? In my experience, too few.

What Razorleaf Does

Talking to the people at Razorleaf, I recognized the approach and skillset they use to implement engineering solutions. Yes, they know the products. But they also know how to help companies transform their processes, change their business, align their organization, and all of the other lessons learned from implementing systems like ERP and supply chain management. I recognize these in part from my research, and in part from spending a number of years with Andersen Consulting (now Accenture) implementing enterprise applications. These solutions require more thoughtful implementations than engineering tools, because improving the productivity of an individual is not enough. They have to improve the way the overall business works together. Not an easy task, but that is where the value comes in. This is what Razorleaf does.

How Razorleaf Fits in the PLM Ecosystem

Why did it strike me that they had this knowledge? Because too few resellers in the engineering software market have these skills. What comforted me, though, was that it is exactly those resellers that call on Razorleaf to help their clients. The good news is that the resellers know – or maybe it is their manufacturing customers – that there is more to a PLM implementation. This is likely the reason that other companies such as Kalypso (an innovation consultant with strong enterprise and PLM skills) is on the scene at so many PLM implementations. I find frequently that companies like these are pulled into implementations early on to help augment the skills of the software resellers (and even the vendors themselves).  It also helps explain the importance of a resseler like NovaQuest (a Dassault Systemes reseller with significant PLM experience)

Impliciations for Manufacturers

Why is this important to the manufacturing community?  If you are implementing PLM, make sure that those doing the implementation understand the different between implementing software tools (CAD, CAM, CAE, etc.) and enterprise applications like PLM. It can be the difference between a technically successful implementation that provides little or no business value (what I like to call a failure) and improving your business performance through the use of PLM technology.

So that’s what I hear from Razorleaf (with some additional perspective thrown in, I think it might be as much “What I Learned” as “One-to-One this time). I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them?

I had the chance to talk with … Chris Randles and Blake Courter of SpaceClaim recently to better understand their role in the broader engineering software market. SpaceClaim hase certainly managed to shake things up, from their initial introduction to the market with direct modeling, their tongue in cheek Twitter plugin, and now their demonstration of the potential use of multitouch manipulation in 3D modeling. This is a company that is clearly set out to change the status quo, and has succeeded in doing so. Other than shaking things up, though, where is the unique value that SpaceClaim offers, and why do they believe there is room in a consolidating CAD market for a new entrant?

Some History and Perspective

Stop me if you have heard this one (or better yet, skip to the next section). SpaceClaim has definitely made an impact on the CAD market.  The company splashed onto the scene with a very different message than the major CAD players. They bashed the limitations that parametric modeling brings with it, and offered “direct modeling” as the next generation of 3D CAD modeling. While most will agree that parametric modeling provides significant benefits, they will also agree that it requires training and knowledge about how to model parametrically, and that existing models require an understanding of how the part was modeled in order to change it. And, in some cases, what appears to be a small change to the design may in fact be fundamental change to the steps in which the CAD model was created (known as the “history tree”) and require fundamental model changes.

Suffice it to say, there was a weakness in the armor of the major CAD vendors, and the weakness was tightly embedded in the strength of their parametric modeling capabilities. That gave SpaceClaim a very strong competitive opening to target. Two other companies, CoCreate and Kubotec, also had direct or “history free” modeling capabilities. But SpaceClaim was the first to really exploit the chink in the armor, primarily because they have very strong roots and credentials in the CAD industry. Founder Michael Payne for example was also a founder of PTC, one of the most successful CAD (and now PLM) vendors in the world and SolidWorks, the disruptive technology that brought 3D CAD to the desktop. So these new entrants came with pedigree, experience, and a differentiated message. The results? Whether the incumbant players viewed it as a competitive necessity, were already developing something in parallel, or just reacted to the interest generated by SpaceClaim, the big vendors have responded:

• PTC acquired CoCreate to offer a parallel solution to their flagship CAD offering Pro/Engineer, and since has announced direct modeling capabilities in Pro/E

• Siemens PLM introduced feature-based, history-free modeling called “synchronous technology“

• Dassault Systemes developed CATIA Live Shape with direct modeling as a part of their V6 solution

• Autodesk announced “Fusion Technology” which aims to incorporate the best of both parametric and direct modeling

What do they Offer? A Different Approach to Design

So why is this important? Other than shaking up the market (which they are pretty good at), they are offering a design paradigm with much lower barriers to entry, and much lower barriers to change. Will this replace parametric modeling? It’s not likely in my opinion. There are inherent advantages to both parametric and direct modeling, with parametric modeling offering less flexibility but more power to develop families of similar parts or parts designed for mass customization. What impresses me, though, is that SpaceClaim does not seem intent on just fighting a battle between the two modeling paradigms. Instead, SpaceClaim is focusing on where each should be used, and how direct modeling can open up new business opportunities.

In particular, SpaceClaim is trying to promote earlier 3D modeling by non-CAD-jockeys. They are focusing on the advantages available from early digital, 3D models to help companies validate their designs early in the product development process. Today, this isn’t as easy because engineers frequently have modern-day draftsmen that translate their designs into 3D models. This is not the formula for rapid design and iteration. SpaceClaim, then, is targeting industrial design, conceptual design, and modeling for simulation and analysis. The designers and engineers involved in these functions are not as well trained on CAD, and require solutions that are more efficient and require less upfront investment (in time, training, etc.). The large CAD vendors recognize this, of course, and are working to increase ease of use in addition to offering direct modeling capabilities. But clearly SpaceClaim has a window of opportunity and some real value to offer.

Implications for Manufacturers?

There is a phrase that I like, “Love me, hate me, but don’t ignore me.” I believe SpaceClaim lives that mantra. They have a place in the market, they are not satisfied with the status quo, and they are innovating. Manufacturers should take a look at SpaceClaim, and consider using them either as a main modeling solution if they don’t have an incumbent tool and don’t require parametrics, or more likely as a complementary solution to address more free-flowing design by non-CAD-jockeys.

So that’s what I hear from SpaceClaim, I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them?

What I learned this week … came from a Youtube video by direct modeling (3D CAD) company SpaceClaim. The video is cool from the music to the product, but after their hilarious April Fool’s joke – how serious is this really? Let’s put aside that question – and the question of how ready this technology may be – until I have a chance to talk with them a bit. In the meantime, what I want to discuss is “why we would care if multitouch came to CAD?”

My Initial Thoughts
What the video shows (OK, please just go watch it, it is worth the two-plus minutes it takes and I could never do it justice) is the use of multitouch capabilities in a CAD modeling environment. It is glitzy and fun, but I think packs some real promise. Why would multitouch be appealing? Other than the fact that it looks cool (and hopefully comes with the techno-music built in) – where would we find business value in such an interface? I have written about multitouch in 3D before and its potential to increase engineering efficiency and increase collaboration at some point, but never really considered it as a real modeling interface (other than when watching a movie) in the near term.

So is There Business Value?

I am sure SpaceClaim has their views on this, and I look forward to hearing them. To me, there are two potential avenues to value that spring to mind:

• More natural interface – people work with their hands. Hands are amazing tools that we start to use when we are very young. Our brains are geared for hand-eye coordination. Many of the computer interfaces developed for modeling are electronic analogies for physical manipulations. After all, where did “cut and paste” came from? Particularly in direct modeling, terms like “push” and “pull” are used, which are much more the words we would have used as we grew up modeling in Playdough, clay, sand, or whatever was available to us. Perhaps we can be more creative when we are closer to our naturally learned modeling techniques? Of course, with the power of technology to extend what our hands can do with rapid calculations and visualization capabilities, we should be much more creative than with a physical material (with all of its inherent constraints). For example, I am much better at “cut and paste” online than with my unaided hands because of capabilities like “snap to grid” and a general lack of dexterity.
• More accessible user interface (maybe) – I was just at Six Flags New Jersey with my son yesterday, and they had a multitouch desktop with photographs on it. It’s tucked away in a little lab behind a bunch of rides, but they have a cool hands-on lab. Kids were walking up to this desktop, sliding the pictures around, and with very little instruction resizing and re-ordering them. Why? It fits into their (physical) paradigm of the world. As much as my kids can learn to manipulate an Xbox controller with levers and buttones to simulate a football game, isn’t it easier to pick up a Wii controller with a motion-oriented interface? So perhaps these capabilities will (eventually) open up 3D modeling to a much broader audience? For example, wouldn’t it be great for a non-engineer to be able to show the CAD expert the change they want instead of describe it and watch the engineer interpret the words and try to model it?

Note: I have posted on the Wii contoller as a user interface as well, which combine physical motion with buttons. My guess is that we are not looking at an either-or between these different interfaces, but multiple interfaces (and hybrid interfaces).

Implications for Manufacturers?

The implications for manufacturers are twofold:

• Keep an eye on this technology - let’s find out how real (and how ready) this is. This is something that is worth keeping an eye on. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t see this as the primary interface any time soon. There are a lot of complex interactions that are likely hard to make gestures for. Likewise, making them intuitive may not be entirely …well… intuitive. This will take some time for the value to be recognized.
• Keep en eye on this company - let’s face it, these guys are creative and out to change the game. Is this the most compelling next step for 3D modeling software? I am not convinced yet. But, a company with the ability to spot an opportunity like this and start walking down the path is a company worth learning from. And I have to note that the video says it will be available “this Fall,”  and that it appears from the video and the credits that this might go beyond modeling to analysis and simulation. Interesting…

So that is what I learned this week, I hope you found it interesting. Let me know what you think. And let’s all wait to hear what SpaceClaim has in mind in regards to making this deliverable product.

What I learned this week … came from a presentation given by Jim Heppelmann and Brian Shepherd of PTC and this week’s PTCUser conference. The presentation gave a view into some of the interesting things that PTC is working on in their solution set, and a peek into their vision for the future of PLM systems. More accurately, what Jim and Brian said the future for their Product Development System as opposed to “PLM,” which is an important differentiation for them.

Overview

User conferences are a great place to let software customers know about all of the great new solutions they should be considering. This conference is no different, PTC has been busy and they have a lot to show off. Of particular interest to me was getting an update on their views on the use of social computing techniques in PLM. I have posted before on PTC’s social product development strategy, and I was looking forward to the update. The most interesting part of the conversation wasn’t directly about social computing, but about how these “community” applications fit in with the rest of PLM…err, I mean PDS.

Enter the “Triad”
I will not do this justice here, so I will introduce it quickly and we can drive some conversation around it in the comments. The core message is that there have been two primary sets of applications for product development and engineering, and now there is a third category. The concept is PTC’s, but I am putting it in my own words below. The three legs of the stool, then, are:

User – This are the individual productivity tools. This is what makes the engineer more efficient in their work. These tools include CAD, CAE, and others. They are the “Microsoft Excel” types of tools, those that help one person at a time do their job.

Corporate – The are enterprise applications. These solutions provide control and coordination across a business. They are typically more complicated, and sometimes require a trade-off between personal productivity and corporate value (such as capturing and managing IP). Many times, users feel these solutions are an extra part of their job as opposed to an enabler, and that they have to “feed the system.”

Community -  These are social computing applications. These help companies collaborate and share information in a lighter weight, looser environment. This is the new area of solutions that promise to drive better team performance.

I have some additional thoughts and questions, but I will hold them for now. The one piece I will share is that these areas are not entirely distinct, and that they get more value when they are together. The value gained from one does not exclude potential value from the others. A quick example is that by logging the collaborative comments in the “community” applications, you are creating new corporate knowledge and IP – but without feeling like you are “feeding the system.” So maybe in the long run the “community” category helps provide some of the control but with a lower level of effort from the user? OK, enough on that from me right now.

Implications for Manufacturers?

In the short-term, this is a new way to look at social computing applications and how they fit with your individual productivity tools and your enterprise applications. It is a way to think about how to complement your current solutions with new capabilities. It is also a good metric to use when evaluating the vision of your PLM solution provider. Are they looking out for all three legs of your triad? They should be.

So that is what I learned this week, I hope you found it interesting. Let me know what you think.

I had the chance to talk with … Drew Sherlock of ShapeSpace a while back, and then had the opportunity to meet him in person at COFES. We talked about the importance of search in in engineering and product development, and how searching by shape is adding another way for companies to find (and hopefully easily reuse) parts. Search has received a lot of attention over the years – particularly as companies are trying to consolidate search across multiple data sources using enterprise search. In design and engineering, search has evolved to include parametric search (search based on attributes, typically on metadata that describes a part) to complement more basic text search techniques. But can a company have too many ways to search? Given the potential benefits of reuse – and the tendency for most people to reinvent the wheel when they can’t readily find a good starting point – I will say “not yet.” Maybe if we find the killer search technique it will change everything, but for now having another way to find relevant parts is a big step forward.

What do they Offer?
What ShapeSpace offers is the promise of a new way to find parts. Finding parts quickly improves efficiency, helps companies reduce duplicate parts (by finding and eliminating existing duplicates), and helps companies reuse existing parts instead of creating new ones (reducing the number of new duplicate, or near-duplicate parts being created). Of these, reuse is one benefit that can be broken down into many valuable improvements:

• Reusing a part saves the time to engineer a new one, speeding time to market
• Reuse eliminates the effort required to design the new part, saving cost
• Reducing duplicates (old and new) helps reduce purchase costs and inventory carrying costs
• Reuse of a part also means reuse of the analysis, validation, testing, and compliance effort for that part

The way they do this is by reviewing CAD files (currently working with Solid Edge) and creating an index of shapes with their product, PartBrowser. Then, people can search (currently on the desktop) via text, sketch, or sample parts. The most intriguing part to me is the way they display the results. The software uses a 3D context to show search results (see graphic) with different panes, or sheets, of 3D thumbnails of parts. These sheets are transparent and grouped logically, and the user can rotate and move them to get a better fit to what they are looking for. This allows them to browse based on visual clues, narrowing in on the shape they are looking for. In this way it is more of a browsing approach, showing everything similar to a shape selected, and bringing the closest matches up in front, plus other suggestions with similarities. A very compelling idea, and a very interesting concept for the interface. For a more in depth look at the 3D context (with the navigation tree and related text) see this sample PartBrowser screenshot.

3D Browsing of Shape Search Results

Who do they Work With?
They are in beta, working with some early customers. One customer in food industry, using it for the designs in their plant and processing facilities, another in the furniture industry using it for dies. The potential industries include any company that uses 3D part designs, which doesn’t limit them very much. The potential for this to be a very generalized tool in the PLM toolkit is significant.

How does this Fit into the Ecosystem?
ShapeSpace is not the first company to offer shape-based search, and certainly not the largest. This is an area that is ripe for innovation, however, and specialty vendors like ShapeSpace are more likely to push the limits than their larger competitors. ShapeSpace is in very early stages of their solution, but will also be very interesting to keep an eye on as their product and company matures.

So that’s what I hear from them, I hope you found it useful. What do you think? What else should I have asked them?