Reflex (building design software)

Reflex was a 3D building design software application developed in the mid 1980s and - along with it predecessor Sonata - is now regarded as a forerunner to today's building information modelling applications.[1][2][3][4]

History

The application was developed by two former GMW Computers employees who had been involved with Sonata. After Sonata had "disappeared in a mysterious, corporate black hole, somewhere in eastern Canada in 1992,"[5] Jonathan Ingram and colleague Gerard Gartside then went on to develop Reflex, bought for $30 million by Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC) in July 1996.[5][6]

PTC had identified the architecture, engineering and construction market as a target for its parametric modelling solutions, and bought Reflex to expand into the sector. However, the fit between Reflex and PTC's existing solutions was poor, and PTC's Pro/Reflex gained little market traction; PTC then sold the product to another US company, Beck Construction, in 1997,[7][lower-alpha 1] where it formed the kernel of a parametric estimating package called DESTINI.[9][10]

Around the same time, several people from PTC who had worked on the Pro/Reflex product set up a new company, Charles River Software (renamed Revit Technology Corporation in 2000, later (2002) bought by Autodesk).[7][9] Leonid Raiz and Irwin Jungreis obtained from PTC a non-exclusive, source code development license for Reflex as part of their severance package. In the words of Jerry Laiserin: "While Autodesk Revit may not contain genomic snippets of Reflex code, Revit clearly is spiritual heir to a lineage of BIM 'begats' — RUCAPS begat Sonata, Sonata begat Reflex, and Reflex begat Revit."[11]

References

  1. ↑ Eastman, Chuck; Tiecholz, Paul; Sacks, Rafael; Liston, Kathleen (2008). BIM Handbook: a Guide to Building Information Modeling for owners, managers, designers, engineers, and contractors (1st ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley. pp. xi–xii. ISBN 9780470185285.
  2. ↑ Eastman, Chuck; Tiecholz, Paul; Sacks, Rafael; Liston, Kathleen (2011). BIM Handbook: A Guide to Building Information Modeling for Owners, Managers, Designers, Engineers and Contractors (2nd ed.). Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley. pp. 36–37.
  3. ↑ Quirk, Vanessa (7 December 2012). "A Brief History of BIM". Arch Daily. Retrieved 17 October 2015.
  4. ↑ Andia, Alfredo; Spiegelhalter, Thomas (2014). Post-Parametric Automation in Design and Construction. Artech House. p. 22. ISBN 9781608076949.
  5. 1 2 Crotty, p.71
  6. ↑ Parametric Technology Corporation acquires object-oriented software technology for project modeling and management PTC news release dated 11 July 1996 (archived at FreeLibrary.com). Retrieved: 17 October 2015.
  7. 1 2 Crotty, p.72
  8. ↑ Beck Technology: About us, Beck Technology. Accessed: 17 October 2015.
  9. 1 2 Weisberg, David (2008), The Engineering Design Revolution: The People, Companies and Computer Systems That Changed Forever the Practice of Engineering. Chapter 16. Available online. Retrieved: 17 October 2015
  10. ↑ BIM software integrates RSMeans for project costing, Mobility Techzone, December 19, 2006. Retrieved: 17 October 2015.
  11. ↑ Laiserin, J. (2003) "LaiserinLetterLetters" (see Laiserin's comment to letter from John Mullan), The Laiserin Letter, January 06 2003.
  1. ↑ Some accounts of the date of this transaction vary: Beck Technology, originally an internal group within Beck Construction, says it acquired the intellectual property rights to Reflex from PTC in 2000.[8]

Sources

Crotty, Ray (2012). The Impact of Building Information Modelling: Transforming Construction. London: SPON/Routledge. ISBN 9781136860560. 


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