I spent a long time at Synopsys and I learned one thing above all else. No one is safe. The people who thought they were indispensable got cut just like everyone else. You are an at will employee which means they can let you go whenever they want. Job security is a myth. If you're smart, keep your resume updated and your network active.
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What i have learned is, Synopsys has no idea what they have purchased. I am pretty sure that the competition knows - poison pill.
This is not to say Ansys was a bad company. In fact, it produced genius level product and results. However, Ansys was not worth $35billion. Add emence aquisition complexity between two established software companies, and the value proposition drops even further. I expect future business school students will study this aquisition as a classic cautionary tail.
This is really about an arms race within the EDA industry. Congrats to the competition, because they convinced Synopsys leadership to spend themselves into oblivion.
As others have pointed out, the competition is going to poach talent and Synopsys may not recover no matter the so-called high switchover costs. As quality of product and culture drop, customers will take notice and head for the exits, never to return.
I truely feel bad for folks who poured years of hard work into what was Ansys only to see it destroyed for such short-sighted lust for greed. There will be better times ahead and other Ansys-like companies do exist. As for Synopsys, the fish rots from the head.
@k1 I have to admit, I wasn't brave enough to stop coding entirely; I'm still at it, though my productivity has plummeted.
@b5 I call BS on that because no way in he-l there's anyone who is writing useful code in this company. Not even with Agents.
@b4 Now I’ve developed a built-in guilt alarm that goes off the second I touch my office laptop after 3:00 p.m.
Welcome to peak Capitalism... race to the bottom. Main issue is that although upper mgmt is aligned to shareholder interests, there are far too many large short-term rewards to be had. Things like large quarterly target rewards and golden parachutes only serve to reinforce self-serving behavior. Sometimes this behavior is in direct conflict with interests of employees and even customers. In the longrun, it is worked out by the system. In the nearterm, real people can be hurt. Throw in some sociopathic personalities and the real fun begins. There seems to be a lot of this in SV these days and sadly Synopsys is not immune.
Best self defense is try to save as much money as you can early on and also become a shareholder. Only people who get rich working at corporations are the execs. The rest of us get sc--wed over and tossed aside eventually. I've made most of my money by being an owner and not a producer. Wasn't always easy and took many decades, but I got there eventually.
"How to make a million dollars. First, get a million dollars."
- Steve Martin
Where do they get these (upper) management people? Is there some kind of special school they go to to learn to be so blind and deaf to reality?
I've never seen normal people, much less rankj-and-file engineers who were so out of touch with the real world.
I am expecting another layoff in the Summer, so I have started to polish my interview skills. I'm sick of the management. When I saw these guys shamelessly talking visions, future, and integrity in the all hands meeting l was fed up.