$20B?
It is fear that gives wings to men... And opens the pockets of companies.
Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
841–850 of 1001 posts
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#842I know Adobe is not really included in the typical anti-competitive criticism like some of the entrenched FAANG's, but this amounts to nothin less than what they do to stifle competition: Point to upstarts like Figma to justify an argument that "No, see? Competition is still possible!" But then buy out that competition to create a metastable state of: 1) dominance w/ noncom practices 2) -> disruption by a slight thre…
They were also one of the companies complicit in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#843I’m incredibly disappointed to see this happening. Adobe has a history for stagnating products and really now that Figma has sold out, their team will naturally start looking for other projects to work on that the core members have life changing amounts of money and the pressure to innovate is off. They have beaten their primary competitor.
It’s funny to see Wall Street’s reaction to this but they don’t understand how much Figma is eroding Adobe’s enterprise businesses. I filled in a survey a few months ago saying I have been using Illustrator and Photoshop less for basic tasks as Figma was so much faster for those. It also fixed the collaboration step. I as the CDO, had dozens of people across our SaaS company using Figma, including the CEO and COO who were using it to design all of their slide decks. At the same time in my side projects working with small product manufacturers and HR consultants I’ve got them using it too as the infinite canvas enables thinking that other established software doesn’t (MS Office, Google). Usually Adobe’s products are only in the design or maybe marketing departments. So Figma was eating out Adobe’s core whilst reaching strongly into other parts of a company that Adobe struggles to reach. The Wall Street types who think Figma was just a pandemic boosted product are blind to Figma’s true position. Just the simple fact that you don’t have to install anything and you have something that can do basic drawing and design tasks is huge.
Congrats to the Figma team on cashing out but RIP in stagnation.
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#844Oh hell no. Adobe is where software goes to die. Which is big shame because Figma has been great, and had serious potential to turn into the first WYSIWYG tool that would actually generate code you'd want to use. But Macromedia software was also great, and now it's mostly non-existent. I'd love for this to turn out different, but I have very low expectations.
> Adobe is where software goes to die. After EA acquiring Westwood, Macromedia is the second biggest let-down of a sale in the software industry in my book. Perhaps Skype comes close.
Skype was already dying. Are you remembering correctly?
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#845Oh well, so dies an amazing product to be locked up behind a massively customer-unfriendly organization. I'd even rather it have been acquired by Google where it could end up being graveyarded, there at least it would, if it survived, have been more easily available. I consider it for practical purposes no less survived now than if Google had killed it. Is there anyone who could have acquired them that would have bee…
Perhaps Apple
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#846This is probably the only tech acquisition that's ever made me sad. I just hate Adobe so much. The nightmare of their installer, the weird store with horrible designs popping up when you activate normal ui stuff, the difficulty in canceling a subscription, and the stasis in their product and ui. Oh and the sloppiness of Lightroom on mac with it's weird ui and that it didn't even import and manage photos well. I've be…
Why can't we just have an open source version which is as good if not better?
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#847Earlier quoted context omitted.
The FTC uses the Consumer Welfare Standard to decide antitrust cases, which means they have to show that a proposed merger would cause tangible harm to consumers. If "reducing competition" was the standard then all buyouts/mergers would be illegal since they all necessarily reduce competition.
I have been thinking about this the other day, and I think buyouts and mergers should be illegal.
This doesn't deserve to be downvoted. Competition is crucial for healthy markets, and the only effect of buyouts and mergers is to consolidate business and decrease competition. If Adobe wants Figma's product, then they can do business with Figma and license it from them. Stop normalizing monopolistic behavior.
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#848This is probably the only tech acquisition that's ever made me sad. I just hate Adobe so much. The nightmare of their installer, the weird store with horrible designs popping up when you activate normal ui stuff, the difficulty in canceling a subscription, and the stasis in their product and ui. Oh and the sloppiness of Lightroom on mac with it's weird ui and that it didn't even import and manage photos well. I've be…
I have an adobe subscription, I never heard of Figma. I am sure their product is great, but it is a niche product. Figma is not worth 20B as a standalone company. Adobe will integrate Figma’s technology into Adobe’s suite of products and will make it available to the masses. I say it is a good thing that Adobe is acquiring Figma. Change is hard; As a Figma consumer you are probably uncomfortable with the change, but…
Hilariously ignorant. I've seen steady adoption into businesses like large banks for UX and design work over the last two years, in domains previously dominated by Adobe. This acquisition looks like a defensive one. They are not saving Figma from death in obscurity, hence the price tag.
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#849Earlier quoted context omitted.
I find myself coming back to this Steve Jobs quote more and more: "It turns out the same thing can happen in technology companies that get monopolies, like IBM or Xerox. If you were a product person at IBM or Xerox, so you make a better copier or computer. So what? When you have monopoly market share, the company's not any more successful. So the people that can make the company more successful are sales and marketin…
It's a great quote for what has happened to the USA in almost every single area, industry, government, education, religious thought, political thought.
It happens here in a unique way, partly because of the legal structure we have around public corporations. In the US, institutional investors want to see revenue growth, even over profits. Way more sexy. And they have ways to arm-twist management by influencing the board, agitating for new board members, etc. They work to frighten other stockholders into supporting them and then management has to go along. Sarbanes-Oxley might be waved around, too.
Normally, a cash-cow business would be a great thing to own. Unfortunately the accumulated cash plus (feared or actual) slowing of growth equal a big red flag.
Re: Adobe to acquire Figma for $20B
#850Earlier quoted context omitted.
> their tools were unsurpassed Why the past tense? Which tools have been surpassed? Have Photoshop been surpassed? I am genuinely curious here. I take note of Capture One, but is it an "acceptable yet technically inferior alternative that I picked because I don't agree with Adobe business practices" (which I think is a valid reason) or a viable alternative even for someone who doesn't have a problem dealing with Adob…
Capture One and Lightroom are definitely fighting in the same class. Both are true pro-grade tools. Some people and some workflows will prefer one of the two, but that's how preferences work. It's basically Coke versus Pepsi.
> Coke versus Pepsi
So, in double-blind tests, most people prefer the 'Pepsi' analogue, but when they know or think they know which one is the 'Coke' analogue, the choose that one?
. o O ( I don't really know which is the Pepsi and which is the Coke, in this matchup. )