In the history of CAD, Jon Hirschtick is a living legend. He is famous for founding SolidWorks, which launched a revolution in how products were designed. SolidWorks was sold to Dassault Systèmes in 1997 and Hirschtick’s reputation was key to gathering funds for what he hoped would be the next revolution: Onshape. This led to Hirschtick’s second pot of gold in 2019 when PTC acquired Onshape. But perhaps the most interesting—and unorthodox—aspect of the success of SolidWorks may be how Hirschtick acquired the funds to launch the company.
CAD insiders are all familiar with the story. There was Hirschtick, a crack blackjack player, who as a student at MIT, won millions of dollars from Las Vegas casinos and parlayed those winnings into the next big thing in CAD. The story started as rumor, grew from reverential posts by SolidWorks’ bloggers and lately, has been told by Hirschtick himself, who almost flaunts his victories over the casinos with classes in card counting, including one in 2009 during SolidWorks World in Orlando.
Hirschtick was able to return to Las Vegas to hold a SolidWorks World on the condition that he stay away from the tables. He enjoys the story of the MIT Blackjack Team as it has been told in book and film forms, though he admits there are inaccuracies. CAD insiders may associate Hirschtick with the character played by Kevin Spacey in the 2008 movie 21, though Hirschtick is careful to dissuade them of the notion. Spacey’s role is a fictional amalgam, according to Hirschtick. Spacey’s Mickey Rosa, a math professor, is John Chang plus Bill Kaplan plus J.P. Masser, according to HistoryHollywood.com. All were leaders of the MIT Blackjack Team but none were professors. Ben Mezrich, author of the best-selling Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six MIT Students Who Took Vegas for Millions, the book that 21 was based on, admitted he made up all the fictional characters and that many of the key events in the book did not occur. Mezrich's book and books and movies that followed make no mention of Hirschtick by name. David Weisberg's encyclopedic History of CAD, which devotes a chapter to SolidWorks, skips over Hirschtick' gambling exploits to funding of $13.7 million by local venture capitalist firms and Japan's Kubota. Yet, the myth persists. How much of it was real? We needed to hear from Jon Hirschtick himself.
In the pretense of discussing the history of CAD, we lure Hirschtick to the Empire, a pan-Asian (Chinese, Japanese and Thai) restaurant in the Seaport District, the revitalized waterfront of Boston. Down the street, PTC’s annual user meeting, LiveWorx, was about to get underway in the shadow of PTC’s towering new headquarters. It is June 10, 2019. Before the year is over, PTC will announce that it will acquire Hirschtick’s Onshape—although we get no clue that a deal is in the making from Hirschtick.
We were hoping that good food and drink would loosen up Hirschtick enough that he would reveal his true role in the MIT Blackjack Team and how much of the winnings went toward financing SolidWorks. We don’t get an exact figure, but we do get in the ballpark—in more ways than one. We learn of his love of the Boston Red Sox and all the Boston teams. We get a better picture of Hirschtick the person, his favorite sandwich (Chicago beef), his prodigious memory and math skills, as well as his hopes for his second act (Onshape).
What follows is part 1 of a freewheeling conversation.
What was your start in the CAD business?
I left Computervision in August ’83. You’re lucky I have a good memory for dates. It was a year later we raised venture capital. It was very hard to raise venture capital for SolidWorks. Nobody wanted to invest in it. People turned us down.
Why?
The feeling was the market was done, that everyone used AutoCAD. Autodesk had a monopoly. And down the street, there was PTC.
You know PTC is having their annual user meeting just a few blocks away?
Yeah.
What do you think of PTC?
I have a lot of respect for PTC. I have a lot of respect for all the CAD companies really. There’s a lot to admire. Mike Payne came to us [SolidWorks] from PTC.
But back then, they were about to give you any money?
Everyone turned us down. You have to remember at the time, AutoCAD was almost generic for CAD. AutoCAD was to CAD what Google is to search. It was more than what Apple and Android is to phones. That’s a biopoly. There were other CAD programs, but basically AutoCAD owned everything in a huge way.
You tried for venture capital, like Shark Tank?
We went to venture capital investors, but it wasn’t like Shark Tank. That was invented for entertainment. We were going into conference rooms, meeting with investors. It was painful. Again, AutoCAD had a freaking monopoly. Everyone had AutoCAD. Period. Then, PTC was coming over the top with 3D. PTC was a juggernaut on execution. You didn’t want to get in their way. Let’s see, who would be like that today? Salesforce?
PTC and AutoCAD had this monopoly on the 2D side, the low end, and PTC on the 3D side, at the high end. People didn’t realize there was anything besides PTC at the high end. PTC was executing relentlessly quarter after quarter—an incredible sales force. It felt like they were taking over the world. And here we come along with “Oh, our idea is to put 3D CAD on Windows.” They looked at me like I had two heads.
Sounds like you hit a wall.
It was a struggle. We could not get investors to invest. They thought it would be very difficult to build [3D parametric history-based CAD] and that there wasn’t room in the market. They felt like CAD was a solved problem. But I believed in it and kept working on it. I told our team we will get funding. I can’t tell how long it will take.
Where was the company located at this time?
In my house.
Where did you grow up?
I grew up in Chicago. I worked for a bit as a professional magician. I did balloon animals and magic tricks.
And card tricks?
That got me going with cards. But that was a part-time job.
This was during high school?
Yeah. I was a good student. I went on to MIT. I started programming computers in 1975 during high school.
[We are interrupted by our waiter, who reminds us to order, leading to a study and commentary of the vast and varied menu and some reminiscing about previous meals we shared together. Hirschtick remembers our giant fish (a branzino) served whole in an Israel-themed restaurant in LA along with pan-Asian restaurants—similar to this one—where he has eaten, what he likes and dislikes. He doesn’t care to share food.]
And creamed spinach?
Creamed spinach? More like spinached cream.
You’re from Chicago. You must have a favorite steakhouse.
In Chicago? When I was a kid, we didn’t go to steakhouses. But these days, my three favorites are Gibson’s, Gene & Georgetti, and the Chicago Chop House.
Remember you promised to show us the best Italian beef in Chicago?
I remember. Then we didn’t go. Next time we’re in Chicago. Engineering.com is in Toronto? Nice town. When’s the next basketball game?
[Hirschtick, a true sports fan, is referring to the NBA championship series between the Golden State Warriors and the Toronto Raptors.]
It’s tonight, actually.
You’ve got to watch that. That’s a big deal. Speaking of championships…. Not to gloat but….
Here we go. Go ahead. Boston’s championships…
We could have another [championship] on Wednesday: hockey. Boston Bruins vs St. Louis Blues, game seven.
Big sports fan, Jon?
Yeah, I'm a sports fan. I most enjoy baseball. Then football, hockey and basketball when they’re in the playoffs. I probably average one game a year live in hockey and basketball. How about you—hockey?
That is the default for us [Canadians]. But the Raptors have got the whole city [of Toronto] excited for the first time [about basketball]. But Boston has been very fortunate with its sports teams. Is the Patriots’ football dynasty like Golden State’s basketball dynasty?
Our football dynasty is like the basketball dynasty if the Warriors win for another decade. Then you could say they are the same. How many championships do they have? Three?
It would be three in a row if they win this year.
How many total?
That would be five total.
They’ve won five? That’s pretty good. We’ve won six championships in football. I don’t know if you noticed. Let’s see, not one World Series but four.
Since ’02, we’ve had 19 championships. In the last 17 years, which covers 18 seasons, we’ve had 17, I think. That’s six Super Bowls, four World Series, a Stanley Cup and a basketball championship. That’s 12 championships in 17 years.
Now you’re just bragging.
And right now, we are one good hockey game away from holding three of them simultaneously.
Unfortunately for Hirschtick, the Boston Bruins were to lose the deciding game and the 2019 Stanley Cup went to St. Louis. As we write this, the New England Patriots lost badly in the first round of the NFL, the second disappointing year after trading away their Super Bowl-winning quarterback. However, the 2021 Red Sox won 92 games and got as far as the AL Championship, where they lost to the Houston Astros. The 2020-2021 Bruins got into the playoffs on a wild card but lost to the New York Islanders in the first round of the playoffs. We’re sure that Boston’s championships will pick up once again, if only because Boston’s rabid sports fans will not have it any other way.
Stay tuned for more of our conversation with Jon Hirschtick.