[4] FME was first released in 1996, and evolved out of a successful bid by the founders of Safe Software, Don Murray and Dale Lutz, for a Canadian Government contract to monitor logging activities.

The ArcGIS Pro software can use the FME engine and workflows as part of the data interoperability extension.

The Information Technology, governmental, utilities, and oil and gas sectors form the largest organisational user base.

[13] Examples of the use of FME include routing for emergency fire response, backend data quality management and sub-surface modelling for infrastructure projects, CAD to GIS file conversions, and BIM data extraction for indoor navigation.

However, the cartographic capability is considered poor, interactive editing tools are absent, and the licensing costs are seen as significant.