Jon Hirschtick

Software developer and founder of SolidWorks
Randy Lyanne Gollub
​
(m. 2011)​

Jon Hirschtick is a CAD software developer, founder and former CEO of SolidWorks, a popular solid modeling 3D CAD and CAE system for Microsoft Windows, and Onshape, a cloud platform for product development that includes tools for CAD, data management, collaboration, workflow, analytics, etc.

Education

Hirschtick holds a Bachelors and Masters' degree from MIT, graduating in 1986.[1]

Career

Hirschtick was director of engineering at Computervision from 1991-1993,[2] and a manager at the MIT CADLab. He was a player and instructor on the MIT Blackjack Team[3][4] featured in the movies 21 and Breaking Vegas.[5][6]

Hirschtick founded the SolidWorks Corporation in 1993 using $1 million he made while a member of the MIT Blackjack Team.[7][8] Under his leadership, SolidWorks revenue eventually grew to $600 million.[9] When Solidworks was acquired by Dassault Systèmes in 1997, Hirschtick continued on as CEO and then a group executive for the next 14 years.[10][11] In October 2011, Hirschtick left Solidworks and in 2012 founded Belmont Technology (later changed to Onshape) with other members of the original SolidWorks team.[12][13] Hirschtick is currently CEO at Onshape.[9] In October 2019 Onshape entered into an agreement to be acquired by PTC.

Hirschtick was awarded the CAD Society Leadership Award,[14] joining Autodesk’s Carl Bass, Dassault Systèmes’ Bernard Charles, and 3D Systems's Ping Fu, and is a recipient of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers Leadership Award.[15] He is a member of the Advisory Board at Boston University and Arcbazar, where he was once director,[10] and is an advisor to Magic Leap and MarkForged, Inc.[16]

References

  1. ^ "Sharing the excitement of mechanical engineering research". MIT News. September 23, 2016.
  2. ^ Bygrave, William D.; eds, Dan D'Heilly (1997). The portable MBA in entrepreneurship case studies. New York, NY [u.a.]: Wiley. p. 84. ISBN 047118229X.
  3. ^ Gomes, Lee (April 1, 2008). "In Cards or Business, Act on the Advantage". Wall Street Journal.
  4. ^ Tim Fryer (13 May 2016). "Ahead in the cloud". Eureka Magazine.
  5. ^ "21 (2008)". IMDb.
  6. ^ "Breaking Vegas (2004)". IMDb.
  7. ^ "Hawk Ridge Systems and ATR Soft Create xBOM Tool for SOLIDWORKS".
  8. ^ Robert Buderi (March 27, 2008). "Of Card-Counting, Startups, and the Real Story of the MIT Blackjack Team". Xconomy.
  9. ^ a b Erin Griffith (March 6, 2015). "Exclusive: SolidWorks vets raise $64 million for Onshape". Fortune.
  10. ^ a b "Jon Hirschtick M.S." Bloomberg.
  11. ^ Mings, Josh (October 5, 2011). "Jon Hirschtick Resigns from DS SolidWorks". SolidSmack.
  12. ^ Ruth Simon, AngusS Loten (August 14, 2013). "Litigation Over Noncompete Clauses Is Rising". Wall Street Journal.
  13. ^ "Belmont Technology is now Onshape, Inc". CIMData. January 9, 2014.
  14. ^ "CAD Society Announces Its 2015 Award Winners and One Surprise Winner To Be Announced At COFES". Cyon Research. April 6, 2015.
  15. ^ "Leadership Award". The American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
  16. ^ Kirsner, Scott (March 9, 2015). "Onshape chairman Jon Hirschtick on CAD, 3D printing, and more". BetaBoston.