No manufacturing product is renewed or updated or revised as regularly or routinely as software, and that increases the necessity (and responsibility) for machine shops and other manufacturers to find the latest releases and functional updates for their chosen program — or the new program that will do what they expect, more effectively or efficiently. This need for up-to-dateness is obvious with CAD and CAM programming, but it’s just as urgent to have the latest toolpath simulators, or software for programming automation devices, or manufacturing extension functions like CMM systems.
As much as manufacturers strive to have the most advanced technologies that will make them more competitive, nothing advances as quickly software.