BigMachines

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article or section needs to be wikified to meet Wikipedia's quality standards.
Please help improve this article with relevant internal links. (June 2007)

BigMachines, Inc. supplies product configuration, quoting, and proposal software to companies that sell complex products. The company's software aims to streamline the inquiry-to-order process for companies with large sales teams or distributor/VAR networks.

The company was founded in 1999 by Godard Abel and Christopher Shutts. BigMachines, Inc. is headquartered in Deerfield, Illinois with development offices in Silicon Valley (San Mateo, California)and Hyderabad, India. The company also has European operations center located in Munich, Germany. BigMachines, Inc. currently serves customers in the Industrial, Hi-tech, Medical, and Software industries. The company's software is designed to integrate with existing ERP (Enterprise resource planning), CRM (Customer relationship management), and other business systems.^[1]

The company has received industry recognition for its application suite, including:

Top 100 Supply Chain Solutions Providers (Supply and Demand Chain Executive, 2007, 2006, 2004)
Top 40 Emerging Software Vendor (Manufacturing Business Technology, 2007, 2005)
Technology Enabler, Progressive Manufacturing 50 (Managing Automation, 2007)

While BigMachines offerings are competitive in the market, pressure from outside vendors has caused the company to make short-term decisions and sacrifice long-term growth. They've been unable to meet promises made to angel and 1st round investors, as have many companies in the tech industry. Nevertheless, BigMachines has been forced as of late to expand their marketshare and reduce their price in a manner that causes many to question its long term viability.^{[citation needed]}