The 3D industry is no stranger to small companies being swallowed up by giant monolithic corporations. We've seen it time and again. Maybe the most prolific example is Autodesk – this multinational software company has made a huge number of acquisitions over its 40-year history, and this focused effort to acquire so many companies certainly has its impact on the industry.
The more notable examples for Autodesk were when they bought Maya in 2006, Mudbox in 2007 and Avid Softimage in 2008. These three in such a short period of time made Autodesk the owner of a range of packages that set them apart as the leading provider of 3D digital content creation software. They went from being one of the players, with 3ds Max as their main offering, to being the owner of a broad range of the 3D packages on the market at the time. It was game-changing.
Another company that has made the headlines for
