Case Study
Actionable Data, Aggressive Enforcement, Multi-Million Profits
Global leader in structural engineering software used Compliance Intelligence to drive 12% topline revenue growth
Related Resources
Provider of high-end modeling software for large scale structural engineering projects with over 5,000 customers in more than 100 countries converts pirates to customers
Challenge
- Transform pirates into full paying customers
Solution
- Capture reliable and actionable piracy data through Compliance Intelligence
- Build a global compliance team to act on that data
- Where illegal use is identified adopt in-application messaging features to halt piracy in its tracks
Benefits
- Identified 4,600 infringing machines, translating into approximately 12% topline revenue growth in 2014
THE NEED FOR A MORE SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO COMBATING PIRACY
A global leader in software for large-scale structural engineering, our customer’s solutions are utilized in modeling and building many of the world’s most complex structures—from stadiums to bridges, skyscrapers to offshore platforms. Structural engineers use its software throughout their projects, designing trustworthy, buildable models that smoothly integrate with fabrication equipment and flow all the way through to construction. Using this software, structural engineers can streamline workflows, collaborate more effectively with others involved in construction, and save enormous amounts of time and money. Building on its flagship structural engineering products, the company has grown to exceed $70 million in annual revenue, and now offers a full portfolio of high productivity software tools for construction, fabrication, and detailing.
Despite extensive use of dongle technology and license management solutions, the customer repeatedly saw its highvalue software cracked and pirated. Senior executives knew their stolen products were being utilized worldwide in some of the world’s largest and highest-profile construction projects. This cost the company millions in lost revenue—and generated security risks for the enormous projects built with this cracked software.
Top decision-makers made the decision to address piracy on multiple fronts, and to seek full compensation wherever possible. As just one example, the company worked with a compliance and enforcement organization to raid companies and seize equipment throughout China, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Spain.
Even after these high-profile enforcement efforts, however, piracy continued to grow. Just months after it introduced new versions, the company would find cracked versions available under multiple names on pirate-friendly global file-sharing networks.
The company needed a far more systematic approach to combating piracy. One of the company’s top regional executives in Asia took responsibility for attacking the piracy problem worldwide, assuming the role of Compliance Director.
He recognized that whatever strategies the company ultimately chose, the rudimentary piracy information it was capturing through its own home-grown solution was inadequate to support them. The company needed piracy intelligence that was more complete, timely, reliable, and actionable.
OVERCOMING SKEPTICISM BY DELIVERING HIGH QUALITY, ACTIONABLE PIRACY DATA
The company’s new compliance director found the Compliance Intelligence solution technically strong, but was skeptical it would deliver sufficient business value. To find out, he worked with Revenera experts to define and implement a trial. In specific, challenging environments, the company would embed Compliance Intelligence in the newest version of its flagship structural engineering product.
If Compliance Intelligence generated more than 60 qualified, actionable leads within the first six months—not just anonymous infringements, but specific, identifiable target accounts—the company would deploy more widely. Compliance Intelligence easily exceeded this short term metric and the company deployed it worldwide.
Within months, Compliance Intelligence was delivering higher quality, more actionable piracy data than the company had previously received, including reliable usage data. To follow up on all the data it now possessed, the company strengthened its own compliance organization, quickly expanding its team from two specialists to five. Well over 70% of the lead information provided to them is generated directly from Compliance Intelligence.
As it has become more familiar with Compliance Intelligence, the company has discovered new ways to use it to strengthen compliance. For example, while scrupulously following privacy regulations in all markets, Compliance Intelligence can return invaluable detail for understanding the scope of infringement and overcoming pirates’ false denials. Compliance Intelligence can also track which features and modules of a software product a pirate is using: information that any software vendor can leverage in negotiations to make a pirate “legal.”
The company also became a pioneer in using in-application messaging technology. It enables the company to precisely calibrate its response to any non-compliant organization. For example, if its first contacts with an infringer are ignored, it might choose to turn off the software’s “save” function. This makes the software essentially unusable in complex projects which rapidly generate enormous amounts of crucial architectural modeling data. Compliance Intelligence provides fine-grained control, allowing our customer to choose when and how it acts to prevent further IP abuse, and encourage an infringer to pursue resolution.
Thanks to Compliance Intelligence and the systems we’ve built to leverage its data with the help of Revenera, I’m bringing millions of dollars of new revenue into this company every year.
COMPLIANCE DIRECTOR
COMPLIANCE PROGRAM MATURITY AND 12% TOPLINE REVENUE GROWTH
The results of utilizing Compliance Intelligence have been remarkable. Soon after the company deployed Compliance Intelligence worldwide, it quickly identified pirated versions of its product on over 4,600 unique machines, including both “prospects” it had never done business with, and many existing customers who were exceeding contract limits or abusing their licensing agreements.
As its global compliance operations have matured, the company has gained deeper experience transforming “potential” revenue into actual revenue. In 2014 (a representative year) compliance teams were responsible for 12% topline revenue growth.
Meanwhile, the visionary line-of-business leader who first recognized the company’s compliance opportunity has since taken leadership of compliance worldwide. In his new role, he is continuing to build out the company’s compliance team, as it pursues the large number of opportunities Compliance Intelligence continues to identify.