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Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

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Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#591

Post by robertlagrant »

itishappy wrote: post #185
robertlagrant wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think this is "ideology" that will cause that? > It shouldn't be normal to expect the government to be involved in approving things except where there's a great reason to need it.

Yes. Your quote is an example of the exact ideology that leads to Standard Oil and company towns.

What is that ideology? "Government shouldn't be involved unless there's a great reason to do so"?

If you think preventing company towns isn't a great reason to need approval, fair enough, but then why are you saying company towns are bad?

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#592

Post by echelon »

bryancoxwell wrote: post #153
pointlessone wrote: post #101

Figma got out better than it was before. It's still a strong product. And Adobe abandoned XD basically giving up this market to Figma.

Not to mention the $1 billion termination fee Adobe now owes them.

Figma's employees are probably devastated and demotivated. Their exit dollar signs just went poof. And they've probably been working on Adobe's roadmap / integration for the past 15 months.

I'm not so sure Figma is in a better spot, even with this new cash in hand.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#593

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

matthewowen wrote: post #554
Bjorkbat wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue that the regulators made their point pretty clear early on when the DOJ opened a lawsuit against Adobe. The people most responsible for keeping this in limbo were Adobe’s lawyers.

This is just straight up factually incorrect: the DOJ never filed a lawsuit to block this deal.

Your comments are straight up factually misrepresenting what happened. There were plenty of news reports early this year that DoJ was preparing to file suit against the merger. I guarantee they were in close contact with Adobe's lawyers, and the normal process here is that Adobe's lawyers/execs come back and say "hold up, let's see if we can make a deal" - that's essentially what happens in the vast majority of lawsuits.

Adobe (and Figma) knew full well this deal wasn't a slam dunk from the beginning.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#594

Post by EricDeb »

endtime wrote: post #578
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #497

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is my favorite comment of the year. We've all become so inured to the idea, especially in startup land, that the purpose of building a business is just the exit (and hopefully we can get out soon enough with someone else "holding the bag"). As you point out, if Figma can build a growing, profitable business, there is no reason they can't IPO at some point. But still, this shows how even the purpose of an…

> that the purpose of building a business is just the exit The majority of those affected negatively by this are not the founders, but the employees. Many of them may have turned down FAANG positions that come with predictable liquid RSUs. Some may have kids (in fact, I know someone at Figma who had a kid in the past year). Liquidity's not necessarily about opportunistically passing on risk...sometimes it's just abou…

Any chance figma can go public?

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#596

Post by Bjorkbat »

matthewowen wrote: post #554
Bjorkbat wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue that the regulators made their point pretty clear early on when the DOJ opened a lawsuit against Adobe. The people most responsible for keeping this in limbo were Adobe’s lawyers.

This is just straight up factually incorrect: the DOJ never filed a lawsuit to block this deal.

I'll admit when I'm wrong. The DOJ announced back in February that it was "preparing to sue", but appears to have never officially filed that lawsuit. My mistake.

Nonetheless, I think my point still stands in that the FTC and DOJ made how they felt about the deal pretty clear.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#597

Post by jasonlotito »

fairity wrote: post #392

> Fifteen months into the regulatory review process, Figma and Adobe no longer see a path toward regulatory approval How in the world did it take fifteen months for regulators to reject this? That’s an absurdly long time to be operating a business in limbo, and I have to assume it’s the regulators dragging their feet since the companies have every incentive to move quickly. I don’t have an opinion on whether or not t…

> How in the world did it take fifteen months for regulators to reject this?

They didn't. They started seriously investigating it less than a month after the announcement and publicly shared this information just over a month later.

> but regulators need to make up their minds quicker

They did. Adobe and Figma were trying to appease regulators by figuring out if there was a way to handle their concerns. They aren't willing to divest themselves enough from their existing portfolio or offer concessions.

If you want them to make up their minds quicker, then the default answer should be No. With weeks not even being an acceptable time frame for action, anything other than No is harmful.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/02/doj-review-adobe-20...

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#599

Post by matthewowen »

jasonlotito wrote: post #581
matthewowen wrote: post #557

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a really inaccurate factual understanding of the sequence of events here: I would urge you to look at the actual timeline of events around the CMA and the DOJ before you keep spreading it.

https://www.politico.com/news/2022/11/02/doj-review-adobe-20... That's a little over a month after the announcement was made. That is "very early on" in the 15 month "sequence of events." Keep in mind, this was the announcements. FTA: "The DOJ has been contacting customers and competitors of Adobe and Figma, as well as Figma’s venture capital investors, in recent weeks, the people said. According to one of the people…

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38685680 (it doesn’t seem ideal to post substantially the same reply in two places)

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#600

Post by echelon »

eurekin wrote: post #294

Adobe acts like a proper "wealth manager" and not a creative company - good for Figma!

Or they could see the competitive landscape for creativity changing fast and view that Figma's product is an evolutionary dead end.

They might see a Gen AI approach to Figma that will kill Figma in 5 years.

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