Adobe's $20b buy of Figma in crosshairs of Europe's antitrust cops

Adobe's proposed $20 billion buy of web-first collaboration design startup Figma has hit a potential stumbling block, after the European Commission confirmed members states raised worries about competition. Sixteen nations including France, Germany and Italy requested the EC investigate the implications of the agreement under …

[ecofeco]

As it should be investigated

This is an obvious buyout and termination of competition.

[captain veg]

if you can't beat 'em, buy 'em

Figma *is* quite impressive.

In my org the designers use it for design, and it works well for them, and the developers use it to crib the CSS properties required to implement the designs, and it works well for that too.

Not entirely perfectly, but it's impressive.

So far as I can tell it draws everything on <canvas> and so has to implement HTML at the raster level. Which it does, surprisingly well.

That you can use it for free is fairly remarkable. Perhaps that's unsustainable. Presumably Adobe thinks so.

What I find disappointing is that Adobe couldn't produce something similar, but just charge for it.

Ah. Maybe they already did, but I never saw it, because it wasn't free. So this move is simply about snuffing out the competition.

As you were.

-A.

[JassMan]

Re: if you can't beat 'em, buy 'em

"Dylan Field, Figma co-founder, says users have nothing to fear about price hikes, and says the app will remain free for education users. "

If you believe that, I have a nice bridge I can sell you cheap.

Also the business case for paying $20Bn which they'll have to recoup from their 1K paying customers means they think they can increase the user base of XD several thousand fold or the the whole deal is a Figmant of someones' imagination.

Some Figma users are fearful Adobe will merge Figma with its XD software – which has a little under 1,000 paying customers – and then hike subscription costs

[sgp]

Re: if you can't beat 'em, buy 'em

It really is a nice piece of software. Ready to be butchered by Adobe.

[eldakka]

Dylan Field, Figma co-founder, says users have nothing to fear about price hikes, and says the app will remain free for education users.

This statement is so misleading. How can a person who will no longer own something make such authoritative statements about what the new owners will do with something once they own it? Once Adobe owns it, they can do whatever they like with it (within the law obviously). That's what it means to own something ...

[sgp]

Dylan Field would like this deal to go through and then never have to work another day in his life. Which is fine for him but also makes it clear we should not believe a word from what he is saying.

[low_resolution_foxxes]

It strikes me that the $20bn is less about the value of Figma as a business entity and more about the potential damage that Figma can issue on Adobe.

You can't compete against an essentially "acceptable" product that is free.

Adobe Photoshop is/was a great tool. But it has become a complicated, pain in the butt for novices, aimed at corporate/business users.

Just look at the numbers - Adobe earns $18bn revenue per year and $6bn profit.

Figma earns $400m per year revenue. It's a pure annihilation of the competition situation. Give it two years, some free features will be scaled back, you'll need a new account style. They will relaunch some features...

If only someone else takes the initiative and creates a freemium Figma clone......DOOO IT!