While this may be true for “fender-benders”, when a vessel with a protruding bulbous bow (such as a relatively high speed container ship) hits something like the USS Fitzgerald, the bulbous bow is going to leave a mark (photo below courtesy of TradeWinds).
In particular, ice-strengthened “goose-neck” bulbous bows are exceptionally good battering rams. There has been some research on “crash-safe” designs such as “collapsible” bulbous bows, but I don’t think anything will be adopted unless the shipowners can see some benefit in using them. The same applies to impact-resistant side structures.
When I’m designing ships that operate in close proximity to other vessels (which have a tendency to blow up when touched inappropriately), I try to favor “soft-nose” design with heavy fendering so that if the two ships come together accidentally, the contact area absorbing the energy will be a as large as possible.