Yet another UK business in tech with great potential now gone. It just seems UK cant grow any big tech company. Even ignoring Tech, most if not all of the big UK companies are in Finances and Services.
Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
281–290 of 353 posts
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#282Official statement from Affinity (Serif): https://affinity.serif.com/de/press/newsroom/canva-statement... Canva’s business model is subscription, are there any plans to change how Affinity is sold? There are no changes to our current pricing model planned at this time, with all our apps still available as a one-off purchase. Existing Affinity users will be able to continue to use your apps in perpetuity as they were…
> at this time
Anything a business says about current business should have 'at this time' appended. They are simply being honest.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#283Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The software itself is a lot better than Adobe in many fundamentals. It’s faster, crashes less, supports a lot more file formats, connection between the individual programs is perfect, they add new quite innovative features at constant pace. I disagree with all your points. I've been using Adobe for 20 years and Affinity Design and Photo since they released in 2013 or so. Adobe apps are faster on Apple Silicon than…
> I haven't experienced a crash in years with Adobe Haha wow. I find this incredibly hard to believe (also Apple Silicon). You ought to play the Lotto. > Design is still missing a lot from Illustrator. "A lot" is drastically overstating the case. And in many ways Designer is leagues better. But it's all kinda moot - fuck Adobe. Fuck their dark patterns, fuck their bugs, fuck their pricing, fuck their monopoly.
> * I find this incredibly hard to believe (also Apple Silicon).*
Believe what you will.
Their software used to crash a lot more for me 5-10 years ago but these days it's pretty solid in this regard.
It used to feel super bloated too but since Apple Silicon it's been working great in terms of perf for me.
> And in many ways Designer is leagues better.
In what ways?
Genuinely interested. I've been using vector graphics software since Corel Draw 4 and Illustrator still seems the gold standard. Figma is great for UI design but it's useless for anything else.
I do think Photo is a lot more usable than Designer and I could see myself using that instead of Photoshop.
> fuck Adobe. Fuck their dark patterns, fuck their bugs, fuck their pricing, fuck their monopoly
Trust me, I too wish there was a good alternative to Adobe. I hope with Canva's money they will be able to improve Affinity's products.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#284From the forum, on the topic of the buyout: "[I] Realise there seems to be a distinct lack of faith flying around here, but we'll be revealing more about our plans in the coming days and yes I'm sure you will all be pleased with what we have to say." - Ash So that's at least possibly a sign of better information to follow. https://forum.affinity.serif.com/index.php?/topic/201413-aff...
Well, we'll see what they have to say. But I wouldn't get my hopes up. "There are no changes to our current pricing model planned _at this time_" is already a very telling part of Serif's previous statement. While they have earned a measure of trust, the problem is that they aren't the ones you need to trust anymore - if Canva wants to turn Affinity into a collection of bloodsucking subscription apps, then that's wha…
The best redeeming feature of Affinity apps was that they weren't a bloodsucking subscription like Adobe. Hopefully they have a plan for the apps that keeps them the best anti-Adobe option.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#285Based on last published accounts (2022) Serif is very profitable and growing strongly: revenue £31.2m (up from £23.4m) and operating profits £17.9m (up from £14.4m). So it doesn't seem like they needed to sell. Of course it is still small in the scheme of things - Canva seems to have revenue of c$2bn - and seems to be owned by three individuals in their 50s so one can probably understand why they wanted to to sell.
>So it doesn't seem like they needed to sell. They probably didn’t need to sell (but who knows) but an offer of a buyout at a 20x multiple (based on the Bloomberg report) when the core business faces competition from Adobe and Canva, not just for core features where depending on context, Serif can do quite well, but also in the burgeoning AI-assisted space, where Serif has zero ability to compete (and AI is a big par…
> Serif can do quite well, but also in the burgeoning AI-assisted space, where Serif has zero ability to compete
I think you've hit the nail on the head. AI tools will become essential and if you haven't got the resources to compete in this area you're likely to fade into relative irrelevance.
And at a 20x multiple probably a steal for Canva too given what this deal will give them - even without raising prices / going to subscription model.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#286I think one thing most people are missing: because Canva has 175 million users with a significant number of them paying a subscription, this enables them to keep the Affinity apps purchase model in place.
Think about it: why would Canva essentially destroy the reason why so many users (around 3 million according to the reporting) went to Affinity in the first place by going to a subscription model? I don't see that happening.
Canva is clear they want a foothold in the professional design market and buying Affinity and its team is the quickest way to get there.
I paid for V1 of the Affinity suite and happily paid for the universal V2 license upgrade which enabled me to run their apps on my iPad and my Mac and even Windows if I ever needed that. It was a bargain.
Ironically, I just removed the last remnants of Creative Cloud last week. I hadn't been using it, but it was there "just in case…".
Unlike when Adobe tried to buy Figma, I'm more optimistic than most that this going to turn out well for existing Affinity users.
I'd have no problem with being able to roundtrip designs between Affinity and Canva seamlessly. Someone could start on Canva and one a project progressed to a certain point, they could seamlessly transition to Affinity. Depending on what you're doing, you can quickly reach Canva's limits and it should be trivial to pickup where you left on in a future version of Affinity Designer or Photo.
Other than being able to configure DropBox, there's no cloud syncing support built-in to Affinity. Sure, you can glue it together with iCloud, OneBox, etc. but that's not what users should have to do in 2024.
I'm no stranger to bad outcomes from botched and user-hostile mergers and acquisitions of software. But this one has all of the potential to go the right way and I have no reason to think otherwise at this time.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#287Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sad, but true
Yes, and let me explain why. Subscriptions are significantly better for a company. They result in a steady income and a predictable growth curve. It's so much easier to plan the upcoming years if you can predict the income. While we all focus on the latest news, the leaders of those companies already planned their next 10 steps ahead, even taking into account our sentiment towards them. Remember that they aim to maxi…
What this means is that OSS offerings will eventually get good enough and eat their lunch, permanently.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#288Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is fairly lucrative business, $2b last year from serving the lower end of creative tools market. They are also about to ipo so this acquisition probably gives the an additinal growth story to sell.
> It is fairly lucrative business, $2b last year from serving the lower end of creative tools market. Started by some 30 yo Australian chick with no tech background too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep21f3ncvBk
This is a rather backhanded take. From what I understand of Melanie, she is one of the few folks I've read about that had a rather unique rags to riches story, and is quite driven. I don't begrudge her level of success.
To that end, despite her interesting story around her role in the business, Canva itself really appeals to the lowest common denominator, which probably explains why they have such gangbuster financials. It really isn't great for true creatives though, and I feel Canva is dragging the industry down, not pulling it up, in the name of profits.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#289Earlier quoted context omitted.
If the pricing model is the only thing that differentiates Affinity then that wouldn’t have been a very good sign for their future
It's clearly enough for many people. That's the only reason I use Affinity, although I do agree Adobe could change their pricing models overnight and they would be in trouble.
Me too.
Re: Canva has acquired Affinity in an effort to compete with Adobe
#290Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Canva we do care about accessibility. While I admit our editor may still have a long way to go on providing an accessible editing experience, unselectable text in export result is more likely an overlooked bug than anything intentional.
And if you're coming from the Affinity side, don't worry your new corporate overlords DO care about people, and employees are their #1 priority
> #1 priority
sorry $MEGACORP, but the employees never actually mattered to you. it's all money. every company wants money.