French computer systems house Dassault Systems SA and IBM Corp, already partners for Dassault’s CATIA CAD/CAM software, have formed a further strategic alliance to develop and sell software under the Product Development Management II name. As part of the agreement, Dassault will buy IBM’s ProductManager Product Data Management system, for $45m, the companies said. Dassault says the acquisition will not dilute its 1998 earnings per share. Dassault will set up a new company, Enovia, to develop PDM II systems and products, and IBM will create a new worldwide organization to market Enovia systems and a second organization to provide business transformation, consulting and implementation services, it said. PDM II will enable companies to manage large quantities of data during a product’s development process and enable simulation, modeling and management of product information over the product life cycle. The market opportunity is considered to be substantial, the two companies said, but they gave no financial details.
