I listened in to the conference call held by Austin Scee of Versata think3. He was there to discuss Versata and the future of think3 on the conference call. Much of this was covered in his letter posted in my previous blog. Here are some of newest highlights:

• Scee and his predecessor have spoken to more than 300 customers since last October. Their mission is for customer success.
• He urged customers, if they are in a quandary as to who to pay for maintenance, to withhold payments until it is clear. Customers can still call Versata for service whether they have paid or not.
• He further urged customers not to pay for any licenses other than those generated from Versata; otherwise “you are stealing from us.”
• The company strategy is: Reset, Revitalize, Relaunch.
• Versata has acquired 20 companies over the last 6 years, most of which were in distress. The first 100 days are the most difficult. [Ed. In this case we are way past the first 100 days!]
• His strategy for the first 18 months is to focus on existing customers.
• Scee unequivocally stated that Versata owns the IP and is asserting its rights in Italy and elsewhere. They bought the rights from think3, Inc., the US based company. Versata believes that the Italian court is using improper legal concepts; that an exclusive license (which they evidently purchased) is the same as an IP purchase.
• An independent auditor was employed by Versata to evaluate the value of think3 before the acquisition. Versata spent millions of Euros on the IP. Versata paid twice what the auditor valued the company.
• There are 15 global “success managers” to support customers [Ed. What we would call account managers.]
• They are looking to improve the usability and speed of think3.
• The company seeks CAD development expertise to “plug into the devFactory.”

Check out devFactory for yourself at www.devfactory.com. It’s pretty obscure what they do and there is nothing that indicates they are part of Versata.

You can check out the website at www.think3.versata.com. Oddly, the support site referenced contains nothing on think3. So far — much talk, but little action!