FAQ
What is being announced?
Trimble acquired the assets of Williamsburg, Virginia-based FabSuite, LLC, North America’s leading supplier of Management Information System (MIS) solutions for steel fabrication.
Who is Trimble?
Trimble is a publicly-held, global company with strong market leadership in the construction and engineering industries, and with 2016 revenues of more than $2.4 Billion. Trimble solutions help to make people, businesses and governments significantly more productive. Trimble is a leading provider of software and hardware solutions across many areas including surveying, construction, agriculture, fleet and asset management, public safety and mapping. Founded in 1978, Trimble is headquartered in Sunnyvale, CA.
Why is Trimble acquiring FabSuite?
The FabSuite acquisition supports Trimble’s long-term strategy and expands the product portfolio to cover the entire lifecycle of fabricated steel structures. FabSuite complements Trimble’s Tekla® Structures and Trimble Connect™ software. With FabSuite, the combined solutions will enable fabricators to achieve efficiency improvements and cost savings by integrating steel fabrication with constructible model workflows.
Why is FabSuite joining Trimble a good thing for customers?
At FabSuite we are extremely excited about this change as, together with Trimble, we believe we have tremendous synergy, shared innovation and vision to make a difference to the structural steel industry. We will be able to offer even better solutions, that fulfill our promise to deliver our customers even more productivity while maintaining the core values we followed as an independent company.
Trimble has a strong commitment and proven track record of investing, innovating and growing solution capabilities to address market and customer needs. Trimble is a stable, reliable and successful company, which believes strongly in the FabSuite strategy. With the acquisition of the FabSuite software, Trimble’s portfolio now includes the complete structural steel workflow for planning, managing, designing, modeling and automating the fabrication processes. The market can now source the industry’s best end to end solution from a single supplier.
As a current FabSuite customer, what can I expect from FabSuite and Trimble?
FabSuite and Tekla customers will benefit from future development that merges the leading design knowledge with the best fabrication management system.
FabSuite View was a first step in bridging the gap between Building Information Modeling and fabrication shop decision making. Expect development that realizes the full potential of estimate-based modeling. Expect more transparent, traceable, and accessible projects via Trimble Connect. And expect a more seamless workflow from detailing, drawing and CNC file production, all the way to shipping assemblies out the door and to the job site.
Will my point of contact change at FabSuite?
No. You can expect business-as-usual from your sales, support and implementation contacts. Continue to use the same email addresses and phone numbers. Likewise, for help with Tekla Structures continue to call your local supplier.
What will happen to the FabSuite product portfolio?
The FabSuite product portfolio will remain as is for now. FabSuite will continue to be developed along the same essential roadmap as before.
I use a steel detailing system that competes with Tekla Structures. Will Trimble continue to develop and support the link between FabSuite and the detailing system that I use?
Trimble is committed to an open strategy and workflows that optimize our customer’s processes. We will continue to support any integration, or links with other partners including detailing and MIS systems.
What will happen to the FabSuite staff?
All FabSuite staff will be integrated into the Trimble organization. All your contacts, telephone numbers, etc. will remain the same.
Will my annual support and maintenance service change?
Your support and maintenance continues as it is with the same people providing the service. Terms and conditions of the service will change to Trimble terms and conditions as it becomes due.
Does this mean better integration with Tekla Structures?
We certainly hope so!! As many of our joint users will attest, we already have good integration between Tekla Structures and FabSuite and it is of course our goal to expand and improve upon that in many ways going forward. The combined knowledge of our two teams is unrivalled and will bring tremendous benefits to steel fabricators worldwide.
Other MIS systems have been acquired in the past and then lost their way; how can you reassure me that FabSuite won’t suffer the same fate?
As a point of comparison, Tekla Corporation was acquired by Trimble in 2011. Since then, Tekla products have gained ever stronger position and brand value in the global marketplace. In the same way, Trimble provides a growth platform for FabSuite by enabling access to wider resources as well as established sales and service channels. As an essential part of Trimble’s complete structural steel workflow solution, FabSuite will continue to transform the way the world fabricates.
Will FabSuite still operate on the same values they always did?
In many ways Trimble is the culmination of its own organization plus its acquisitions: It is always our intention to grow and learn from the companies we buy and the people we inherit from those acquisitions. The FabSuite staff will continue to serve in roles to support our customers and we hope the service level will be at least the same and potentially higher.
Will there still be a FabSuite User Conference in 2018, and if so, when and where?
Due to the acquisition we will be postponing our user conference this year to enable us to host a joint conference with Trimble. Dates and times of this to be forthcoming.
Key messages
●Trimble is acquiring the assets of FabSuite: The FabSuite products will become part of Trimble’s solution offering and the FabSuite staff will become integrated into the Trimble organization.
●All contact details - emails, telephone numbers - remain the same and all staff continue into the new business. You can expect the same level of support next week as you received last week.
●Trimble and FabSuite were already working together on integrating some of their respective products and this will not only continue but accelerate.
●Trimble, like FabSuite, believe in open systems and the ability to provide customers with the best solution available with the solutions already in place. This is a shared philosophy that will continue to support workflows with other products outside the Trimble offering.
Where can I find more information?
●For more information on the FabSuite product offering, visit
●For more information on Trimble’s Tekla product offering, visit
●Questions should be directed to your Account Manager or Customer Care Manager or to .
Further contacts:
General /Chris Moor / / 813.480.7017
Ryan Vander Plaats / / 708.473.7940
Matthew Gomez / / 813.751.5566
Diana Larson / / 805.434.6092