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Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

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Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#991

Post by shortsunblack »

blagie wrote: post #288
preommr wrote: post #164

What a disaster for Adobe. They signal they can't build something to outcompete Figma. Their stock price falls They axe their existing competing product, and is therefore now way behind. They face problems with the acquisition, which makes their stock price fall again because it signals that not only can they not build products they can't use their money to buy companies that do. Then it's confirmed they can't acquir…

I don't think that's a correct analysis. Adobe is very good at building software. It's not the problem. It's not that Adobe can't compete with Figma. It's that they don't want to. Adobe has a great engineering team and ships wonderful products. The problem with Adobe is that the business side is anticompetitive, exploitative, and sleazy. Buying Figma, they lose a competitor. Competitors have a nasty tendency to expan…

Premiere is a piece of trash that crashes on first breath. Adobe also operated Flash for quite a long time. Another amazingly engineered product, supposedly. I do not think your assesment of Adobe's engineers are accurate.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#992

Post by quickthrower2 »

mortenjorck wrote: post #520
codeptualize wrote: post #126

That is wild. It's a good thing as it means Adobe won't ruin Figma like they did with so many great software products before, but just imagine founders, investors and employees, thinking they had a really good exit.. That must hurt, I hope they can stay motivated. If Adobe can't buy them, what other exit options do they have? Go public?

I doubt we'll see anything in the next 12-18 months, but at some point in 2025-26 I would expect one of the following, in order of likelihood: 1. Microsoft acquisition 2. IPO 3. Salesforce acquisition The above are also in descending order of valuation. Adobe's $20B was pure pandemic-bubble premium; I doubt MSFT would pay much over half that, Salesforce less still, with an IPO somewhere in the middle. The more intere…

Maybe Canva would buy them? Or merge I guess

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#993

Post by rangestransform »

samhuk wrote: post #292
kibwen wrote: post #208

Every time a merger fails, an angel gets its wings. Force megacorps to actually compete rather than just snapping up their potential competitors. Force startups to aspire to create an actual product rather than just manipulating the lizard-brain fears of irrational megacorp execs in the hopes of a payout.

> Force startups to aspire to create an actual product rather I'm getting on to 10 years in the software industry as an engineer at the moment and in my view this is one of its most disappointing and frustrating aspects. The whole software start-up scene just feels saturated with FIRE-obsessed individuals who prefer just about anything (money, vacation, travel, fame, ...) over company, product, real building, craftsm…

Those things don't have to be mutually exclusive.

I taught myself to code in high school, and I like what I work on (robotics); it used to be a weekend hobby in college before it became my real job. I also like Michelin star dinners, travelling, live music, skiing, etc.

Expecting people in our industry to prefer "company, product, real building, craftsmanship" over getting paid is how we end up getting paid like nonprofit employees, EMTs, and other professions where people's desire to do good is exploited to drive down salaries.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#994

Post by samhuk »

rangestransform wrote: post #993
samhuk wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Force startups to aspire to create an actual product rather I'm getting on to 10 years in the software industry as an engineer at the moment and in my view this is one of its most disappointing and frustrating aspects. The whole software start-up scene just feels saturated with FIRE-obsessed individuals who prefer just about anything (money, vacation, travel, fame, ...) over company, product, real building, craftsm…

Those things don't have to be mutually exclusive. I taught myself to code in high school, and I like what I work on (robotics); it used to be a weekend hobby in college before it became my real job. I also like Michelin star dinners, travelling, live music, skiing, etc. Expecting people in our industry to prefer "company, product, real building, craftsmanship" over getting paid is how we end up getting paid like nonp…

Would you rather use a product that somebody treats as a vehicle to "Michelin star dinners, travelling, live music, skiing, etc.", or a product that somebody deeply cares about more than those things?

My point is not "care 100% about your job/company/product/idea and 0% about everything else", but rather striking a better balance.

To bring it back to the OP, selling Figma to Adobe was, in my view, part of an epidemic of SaaS companies valuing payout above creating a long-term sustaining business.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#995

Post by michaelcampbell »

codeptualize wrote: post #939
kpandit wrote: post #826

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My bad. I was just responding to the parent comment and the comment(by showbug) they were replying to in isolation. Figma is a product I liked and was so terribly disappointed with the news of acquisition by adobe. Regarding startups, I just did google "define: startup" and in the dictionary definition there has no VC and no exit.

We can debate definitions and labels but that's not really relevant to the discussion imo, name it whatever you want, what I'm referring to is a company taking VC money to accelerate growth. Once you take VC money, like Figma did, your goal is a lucrative exit. It's high risk, high reward. It's a different way to build a company, and it's not really possible to change that once you take that route. Doesn't mean you h…

> It's high risk...

for everyone

> , high reward.

for the owners, solely.

For everyone else, notably generally those that actually produced the thing of value, the reward is that if you're VERY VERY LUCKY, you get to keep your job.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#996

Post by ang_cire »

kelnos wrote: post #807
solatic wrote: post #760

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the original intention was to get access to public market funds to grow a business. Now it's usually just a method of "exit" to let retail investors take the lion's share of the risk Founders and employees would be totally OK with staying private, if the board would ever permit issuing a dividend. That's the "normal" way to have an "exit" (i.e. return profits to shareholders) without a public offering. The purpose…

In the case where a private company has issued options or shares as a part of compensation, another way to pay back employees would be to do a stock buyback program. E.g. if I was an early employee and got options with a $1/share strike price, but the current going rate for new-employee options is $5/share, the company could offer to buy back my options from me at $4 each (or if I'd exercised those options, they coul…

Even if it's VC backed, there's little reason for the VCs to prevent them doing a non-takeover tender offer in order to allow employees to cash out some (often capped) portion of their vested options and let in a new private shareholder.

And as someone who went through an acquisition exit in a just-shy-of-unicorn startup by a very big dog, yes, everyone's/VC's aversion to IPOs is definitely making it easier for said big dog companies to acquire people who in the past would have been shoe-ins for excellent IPOs.

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#997

Post by Dayshine »

Zenul_Abidin wrote: post #476
Dayshine wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do people keep recommending this? If you do this the next step they take is sending your debt to collections, and now you have either ruined credit or a court case.

A virtual debit card should prevent collections from getting involved though, since there's literally no debt.

You have agreed to a contract, so there is debt...

Re: Figma and Adobe abandon proposed merger

#998

Post by c0nsumer »

fzzzy wrote: post #979
c0nsumer wrote: post #967

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really, really, really want to use the Affinity suite for more stuff, but just the other day when I was trying to knock up a basic drawing of something that exists in real life (a bicycle frame) I found that Designer couldn't draw a line of X length at N angle. It just... didn't have the option. All I wanted to do was draw a few lines of given lengths and angles and join their ends. Then overlay another set of the…

Can't you just draw a line of X length and then rotate it to N?

You have to draw a line, then edit all it's parameters. It's a pain.
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