Vendors providing services and tools for construction-sector collaboration are finding themselves at the center of industry consolidation.
German software vendor Nemetschek AG, publisher of Vectorworks CAD software and the 3D BIM tools from Graphisoft, said on Oct. 3 that it has acquired Bluebeam Software Inc., vendor of widely used PDF-based collaboration tools. It says the price is $100 million.
Ten-year-old Bluebeam, based in Pasadena, Calif., has about 150 employees. It claims its U.S. users include 74% of the Top 50 contractors and 64% of the Top 50 design firms, as ranked by ENR. Users also are located in more than 100 countries, says the firm.
The acquisition "strongly reinforces" Nemetschek's presence in North America and brings to Bluebeam the new owner's "extensive" market presence in Europe and Asia, the company says. "With its open BIM philosophy, Nemetschek is committed to making project information available to everyone, a belief strongly held by Bluebeam, as well," Bluebeam CEO Richard Lee adds.
Bluebeam strengthens Nemetschek's portfolio by adding drawing-based workflows to augment its open-standards, model-based BIM workflows, says Patrik Heider, the Munich-based firm's chief financial and operating officer. Nemetschek was founded in 1963 and has been publicly traded since 1999. It claims to have 1.2 million users in 142 countries and 2013 revenue of $235.6 million.
Separately, Newforma, a vendor of project information management tools, said on Oct. 6 that it acquired SmartUse, a Montreal developer of a touch-friendly mobile software platform for project collaboration. The app operates on Apple tablets and computers as well as on Windows devices, including a 55-in. workstation.