Microsoft Buying Adobe? • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#101

Post by ThomPete » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:04 PM UTC

narkee wrote: post #89

zokier wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gotta love stock markets. A rumor arises of two CEO's secretly meeting, and stocks skyrocket instantly. I'd assume that nobody actually knows what they were discussing, if they even met. Wouldn't be much of a secret meeting otherwise.

It's really interesting, when you think about it as a system that changes in response to observation. Can you imagine if physical systems worked like that? That observed physical phenomena would change in response to what the experimenter/observer thinks will happen?

It kind of do according to QM.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#102

Post by protomyth » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:05 PM UTC

old-gregg wrote: post #74

Jokes aside, it makes perfect sense for both of them. Adobe's CS and Microsoft Office are naturally self-complementing desktop giants. Both companies make a ton of money selling desktop software to the enterprise, yet outside of Flash/Sliverlight battle they don't cross each other paths. I, for one, welcome this development. It brings some hopes for better performing Flash, which I hate with a passion but its a fact…

Adobe sells a lot of enterprise document software that could really boost Microsoft's Share Point properties.

I really do think all product development for Linux or Android would be cancelled (Flash for Windows Phone 7 only).

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#103

Post by chollida1 » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:05 PM UTC

mcbain wrote: post #67

matrix wrote: post #34

I suppose this is feasible if Microsoft is looking to acquire Adobe's enterprise customer base - the PDF, document management, etc part of the company. Having Air/Flex/Flash might also be nice, but doesn't seem like a good fit for Microsoft's traditional Windows-centric strategy (one they should abandon, in my view - the days of owning the market via the desktop are rapidly coming to a close). What I'd love to see is…

What is Microsoft's track record for spinning off companies? The Photoshop/CS part of Adobe is somewhat profitable, correct? Would MS let it go (even for a bucket of cash)?

The Rare team was spun out of Microsoft. They were the video game company that Microsoft bought from Nintendo. They were responsible for Golden Eye, Conquer, and Perfect Dark.

I'm not sure if this would be considered a successful spin off though as Microsoft bought them when they were, IMHO, at their peak.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#104

Post by protomyth » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:09 PM UTC

andybak wrote: post #76

brudgers wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that were Adobe to leave the Windows market, the vacated "niche" would be quickly filled.

It might be harder than you think to replace highly refined creative tools such as Illustrator or Photoshop. Although they have become rather bloated and the last few versions have failed to innovate in significant ways, there is a lot of graphics professionals who would be very reluctant to waste all that hard-won muscle-memory. Plus there's a lot of work-flow knowledge in them there apps.

Not to mention all the color patents.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#105

Post by iamelgringo » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:14 PM UTC

pchristensen wrote: post #93

old-gregg wrote: post #74

Jokes aside, it makes perfect sense for both of them. Adobe's CS and Microsoft Office are naturally self-complementing desktop giants. Both companies make a ton of money selling desktop software to the enterprise, yet outside of Flash/Sliverlight battle they don't cross each other paths. I, for one, welcome this development. It brings some hopes for better performing Flash, which I hate with a passion but its a fact…

Not disagreeing, but Innovators Dilemma theory says that companies that are about to be disrupted are enjoying the greatest profits and margins ever. The problem is that the reason the profits are so high is that they've shed their less profitable divisions and products that might grow into the next big innovation. Let's say something disrupts MSFTs Office and shrinks its revenue - what do they have that could replac…

what do they have that could replace that? Sharepoint, SQLServer, Windows 7, Windows Server, Windows Virtual Server, CRM, Exchange Server, XBox, Xbox live, Bing, Zune, Microsoft Automotive platform, Win 7 phone.

Microsoft has one of the most diverse revenue streams of any software company. They're going to be around for a while.

Google should actually be more afraid of disruptive technologies. Their revenue is primarily from advertising. They are truly a single revenue source company.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#106

Post by jranck » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:14 PM UTC

mcbain wrote: post #67

matrix wrote: post #34

I suppose this is feasible if Microsoft is looking to acquire Adobe's enterprise customer base - the PDF, document management, etc part of the company. Having Air/Flex/Flash might also be nice, but doesn't seem like a good fit for Microsoft's traditional Windows-centric strategy (one they should abandon, in my view - the days of owning the market via the desktop are rapidly coming to a close). What I'd love to see is…

What is Microsoft's track record for spinning off companies? The Photoshop/CS part of Adobe is somewhat profitable, correct? Would MS let it go (even for a bucket of cash)?

Razorfish was acquired when Microsoft bought aQuantive. It was then spun off and sold to Publicis.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#107

Post by _delirium » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:17 PM UTC

pchristensen wrote: post #93

old-gregg wrote: post #74

Jokes aside, it makes perfect sense for both of them. Adobe's CS and Microsoft Office are naturally self-complementing desktop giants. Both companies make a ton of money selling desktop software to the enterprise, yet outside of Flash/Sliverlight battle they don't cross each other paths. I, for one, welcome this development. It brings some hopes for better performing Flash, which I hate with a passion but its a fact…

Not disagreeing, but Innovators Dilemma theory says that companies that are about to be disrupted are enjoying the greatest profits and margins ever. The problem is that the reason the profits are so high is that they've shed their less profitable divisions and products that might grow into the next big innovation. Let's say something disrupts MSFTs Office and shrinks its revenue - what do they have that could replac…

It's quite possible for it to take a long time, though. Microsoft has been more or less in the position you describe for ~15 years: by the mid-1990s they were making huge profits, almost entirely from Windows+Office. Now, 15 years later, they've still got large profit margins on that same duo.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#108

Post by Keyframe » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:21 PM UTC

virtualritz wrote: post #100

Keyframe wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Softimage was bought for a purpose and spun off later. It was bought by Microsoft to port Softimage|3D (and develop XSI) for NT platform - to show NT is as powerful for those applications as IRIX was. It was done, and it was sold later to AVID, now Softimage is part of Autodesk. On a side note, I always thought Autodesk was Adobe's natural predator, I was expecting a buy offer from them.

It took Soft years to recover from that imho. When I wrote a an XSI plugin for a feature film production, in 2005, for XSI running on Linux, half of the API was still using COM, it the app required a special gcc version that shipped with the sdk to compile plugins with and the Python was ActiveState Python (which clashed with the Linux system's Python). In short, it was a disaster from a developers, and still a lot o…

I agree, Softimage was just mishandled. It was brought into Microsoft with a single task, and Sumatra(XSI) was architected at a really bad point in time for them. It was done on the verge of NT era, so they went berserk. Softimage (they have renamed XSI) is now a really solid piece of software, AGAIN mishandled by Autodesk. sigh.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#109

Post by chime » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:32 PM UTC

iamelgringo wrote: post #105

pchristensen wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not disagreeing, but Innovators Dilemma theory says that companies that are about to be disrupted are enjoying the greatest profits and margins ever. The problem is that the reason the profits are so high is that they've shed their less profitable divisions and products that might grow into the next big innovation. Let's say something disrupts MSFTs Office and shrinks its revenue - what do they have that could replac…

what do they have that could replace that? Sharepoint, SQLServer, Windows 7, Windows Server, Windows Virtual Server, CRM, Exchange Server, XBox, Xbox live, Bing, Zune, Microsoft Automotive platform, Win 7 phone. Microsoft has one of the most diverse revenue streams of any software company. They're going to be around for a while. Google should actually be more afraid of disruptive technologies. Their revenue is primar…

Also the entire Dynamics series. Web people don't understand the ERP world and the profits that come from annual maintenance plans. What is Dynamics? It's what runs the internal systems for most small/mid-sized businesses that can't afford Oracle/SAP. It's a HUGE market.

Re: Microsoft Buying Adobe?

#110

Post by bluesnowmonkey » Thu, Oct 07, 2010, 10:35 PM UTC

iamelgringo wrote: post #105

pchristensen wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not disagreeing, but Innovators Dilemma theory says that companies that are about to be disrupted are enjoying the greatest profits and margins ever. The problem is that the reason the profits are so high is that they've shed their less profitable divisions and products that might grow into the next big innovation. Let's say something disrupts MSFTs Office and shrinks its revenue - what do they have that could replac…

what do they have that could replace that? Sharepoint, SQLServer, Windows 7, Windows Server, Windows Virtual Server, CRM, Exchange Server, XBox, Xbox live, Bing, Zune, Microsoft Automotive platform, Win 7 phone. Microsoft has one of the most diverse revenue streams of any software company. They're going to be around for a while. Google should actually be more afraid of disruptive technologies. Their revenue is primar…

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