Well… we used to have 18 sketchup pro users, and now i’m the last one at my firm.
I agree with your comment about the “one BIM Model” being the goal. The lack of a real-world coordinate reference system has been a huge problem for us and has driven many away from SketchUp as a serious professional tool - no point using it as a first-stage conceptual modeller if the results can’t be linked in to project data (maps, existing site context, etc).
Rhino has been taught at universities for 10+ years now, where I’m from, and the attraction is partly that it does all types of modelling, as well as the advanced grasshopper stuff (which people want to get into, because it’s “the future”.).
The documentation and model/project management aspects arent needing to be covered by Uni Students. They like the organic shapes and the nice rendering outputs.
I dont see Rhino getting more popular but I do see Blender on the rise.
IMO SketchUp still has a niche in Arch, LA, Urban Planning and transport sectors - the professional tools, however, are still too limiting and users to have to rely on so many extensions for basic things (even selecting objects). LayOut is a real chore on complex projects or if you happen to work with large/heavy data (terrain and imported 3d models).
I also wonder, with such a diverse way of using Sketchup (thanks to 100s of extensions), how are people supposed to learn as a faculty or profession? How can industry-standard workflows be developed, or tighter integration achieved with other software?
That’s why I continue to advocate for Trimble-curated “packages” of extensions that are bundled together for a specific industry or project type. I think it’s time to bring some of the common extensions/tools “in house” and integrate them with the SketchUp Pro toolset.