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Component Manufacturing dverti$er
Don’t Forget! You Saw it in the
Adverti$er
July 2019 #11240 Page #8
Celebrating 50 Years of Truss Design Innovation Part XII: Walls Get in the Way Joe Kannapell - P.E. Senior VP, MiTek USA www.mitek-us.com
J
ust because two CEOs agree to build a computer model of a house in 3 years doesn’t mean it’s feasible. And barely a year into the agreement between TrusJoist and MiTek to merge software, we realized that we couldn’t do it. Meanwhile our competitor, Tommy Wood, had a workable “parametric” solution. Our “OptiFrame” effort seemed to be aimed at the executive suite, while Tommy was targeting truss and panel designers. Before Tommy hawked his IntelliBuild solution, few CMs sought more than a strong truss program. Most applauded our OptiFrame efforts, but the bulk of them avoided (or had been burned by) the highlycyclical wall panel market. As a result, our 1990’s attempt at whole house design, called eFrame, had received mixed reviews from both truss designers and panel designers. eFrame users complained that we had strayed too far from the simplicity of our (A.C.E.S.) roots, and that we failed to deliver increased productivity. Thankfully we gained a reprieve during this period as heavier designer workloads mitigated against software changes. Most eFrame users had to stumble along until the “better mousetrap” arrived. But we couldn’t ask them to wait too long, as IntelliBuild had the added backing of Illinois Tool Works (ITW). And similarly, MiTek had become part of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway. The stage was set for a competitive clash.
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