[grim]

As Mr. Mather mentioned, they are fairly identical in functionality.

Where I see the biggest difference is that Inventor has the Design Accelerator and Content Center giving you design functionality for gears, pulleys, springs and such and parts to build with. The new functionality in 2009 will also make frame generation much easier by allowing custom profiles to use. Think extrusions.

I also see differences in DWG fidelity. Solidworks uses the OpenDWG alliance source code to handle DWG files and it is not always 100% accurate. Inventor can now use DWG as a native format that is 100% accurate. This is important in industry where DWG is a standard.

I do beg to differ on the use of Inventor vs. Solidworks in industry. I see them as fairly equal in this area with Inventor gaining the edge. It does depend on the industry and the location though.