Figma Question

[Carlisle1500]

Can someone talk about this acquisition of Figma? Is XD dead?

See attached

[Carlisle1500]

@thomashallgren  I appreciate your comments here and I get the public good thing. Firms today believe public good in OSS means the public gets the most useless version of the product they have purchased. They ONLY care about cash/stacks...

I look at FB and what a horrible company they are and I wouldn't want this product by another "enlighted" millenial trying to do "no harm" or become the face of "public good" I know why Adobe really paid 20b is because the BIG firms can pay more and this offer lets them stay in the game in the most important part of the creative business.

[thomashallgren]

They spun up a community around Figma, then #rugpull, sold to Adobe. Community goes away. Adobe left holding bag.

[thomashallgren]

See  ƒractally. Figma (or a future competitor) could be launched as a DAO that way.

Also GoFractally Let me know if you would like an invitation.

[Peter Villevoye]

It's a company's choice to do with their tool what they want to do with it.

And with regards to Figma, I think it's too late to ask or expect that Adobe will turn it into something public. Maybe you should target other upcoming tools (and their owners) to endorse this policy.

[thomashallgren]

When a done deal, then the Figma purchase will be the most significant design tool acquisition since After Effects. After effects just got multiprocessor capability last year. Maybe this will help Adobe to learn how to iterate and update products (relatively) more quickly. 

[Peter Villevoye]

Don't be ridiculous. Adobe is not a monopoly. There are hundreds of companies competing with them in many areas. They're dominant in print and imaging, strong in audio/video, just starting in 3D, but especially in web and app design they were just a small market player between dozens of other tools (hence the acquisition).

[thomashallgren]

Somewhat politically correct. What other company competes with Adobe on their scale? ...

[Peter Villevoye]

Well, the landscape isn't so monotonuos at all !

In the print area, no one actually really tries or cares...

Canva shaves off the less professional users, and Affinity only caters for customers who don't like subscription models. Both have succeeded in partly mimicking and partly simplifying the interface and workflow, but Adobe retains its dominant position for professional in this area.

In imaging, Photoshop and Illustrator are dominant.

There have been various others, from Cricket Draw and Corel Draw to FreeHand and Inkscape, from PaintShop and Pixelmator to GIMP, Affinity and ProCreate. Some gain traction, some remain amateuristic. So Adobe stays in charge, keeps it up by constant moving around, with spin-offs (Lightroom, Elements, etc.) and dozens of mobile apps and services (of which I don't keep track anymore...)

In video, there have always been a couple of strong market players.

In the early decades there were Adobe, and Avid, and a lot of specialized systems. Then Apple entered this area, with Final Cut and some other tools. Now, Davinci is also making waves. So Adobe continuously needs to stay in shape and be alert for what competitors come up with.

In music, Adobe never really wanted to played a serious role.

In 3D, they only just started, by concocting a 3D bundle of tools.

Earlier attempts (3D in Photoshop) were a laugh, 3D in After Effects is actually 2D planes and simple shapes with perspective, and recent apps (3D in Illustrator and Dimension) are low profile. While other popular 3D tools like Maya, Blender, and Cinema4D have been soaring.

In digital (web and app) design, their role has been varying.

In the early days, they now and then suprised users with alternating (mostly acquired) tools, like PageMill, GoLive, LiveMotion, ImageReady, DreamWeaver, FireWorks, Edge Animate, Muse, and last but not least Flash. They tried things with digital publishing but left the "creative" area and went overboard with their Experience Cloud for marketing and analytics. But creatively nothing lasted, not even XD, I'm afraid...

So you might have the impression that Adobe is a monopoly, but they're defeinitely not. At best, they're dominant in some areas, but even that comes not naturally to them. They have to stay on it, constantly !

[Carlisle1500]

@Peter Villevoye  The "Bundle" is the monopoly tool. Microsoft did it to IBM and now Adobe is doing it to the creatives. Substance & Base Creative cloud are unmatched.

[Peter Villevoye]

I think I don't understand your definition of a monopoly. There's a difference between offering an "all you can eat" buffet of creative tools, or customers being forced to buy a product from one supplier, simply because of the lack of competitors.

[HARSHIKA_VERMA · Accepted solution]

Hi All,

We apologize for the delay in response and thank you for your observations. 

What’s the plan for XD? Will Figma become part of XD, or will XD be EOL?

We will continue to serve our existing Adobe XD customers. Post close, we look forward to engaging with the XD and Figma communities to understand ways we could add value. Key info: adobe.ly/3BEzZ2n 

Thanks,

Harshika

[thomashallgren]

Thanks. We already know what will happen. Community in tears.

[Peter Villevoye]

Hi Harshika, thanks for this official statement and the link to the thoughts of David Wadhwani. I value both a lot.

After decades of hopeful intentions but also some very disappointing moves, this seems to me as a final chance for Adobe to get their web and app design act together ! I expect Adobe to have learned from their dwindling past in this area. The impact of this aquisition is huge, and the stakes are high, both for Figma and Adobe. Will Figma succeed in retaining their strength, and (under Adobe management) be able to improve and innovate even further ?

A tool like Figma deserves staying power, and I hope Adobe will help them building that up.

[rayek.elfin]

In my opinion, which is based on experiencing Adobe's history of three decades of botched attempts to become a major player in the web and/or app/dev design market segment, their latest endeavour is already headed for failure UNLESS management will allow themselves to change tack entirely.

After observing Adobe as a company struggling in those markets, I've come to believe that the behemothian business structure and hierarchy inherent to Adobe, are the very reasons why they possibly may not ever be able to compete due to their rigid, cumbersomely slow, and reactive business practices - which is anathema to the quickly evolving and changing dev design community and market.

It's a simple enough strategy to throw in the towel, i.e. dropping your own competing products, and instead buying out the market leader's business. But for Figma to continue to thrive, Adobe must allow the Figma team and company to remain as independent, assertive, disruptive, and forward-thinking as they were before the acquisition (and yes: that also means even before the rather stupid business decisions the Figma team has been making lately - Adobe may be about to acquire a company with cracks and chipping in the varnish).

I might even state here that the very action of removing your primary competitor and its products from the market in this manner almost immediately removes a great deal of business motivation to continue to be innovative and forward-thinking to ensure the continued success of those products.

I'd venture one more step here and muse that sooner rather than later YET another small upstart entrepeneur will break into the market that you intended to dominate with your acquisition, with a new rules-breaking disruptive product that drives your former market leader into a blind alley. And allow other competitors in the market to discover a new zest and drive to improve their products. Because you are the behemoth and slow to respond and lack the innate business motivation to stay ahead of the game.

I find it doubtful that Adobe's management is capable of maintaining market primacy with Figma in the midterm or long term run. So far they've again and again proven themselves to be reliable enough to mess things up.

History teaches us that they will allow Figma to stumble and fall from grace, unless they change their thinking: however, I feel Adobe's management just can't help themselves in this regard. It's the innate nature of the Business Behemoth.

My bet is against Adobe and Figma. We shall see what happens...

[Peter Villevoye]

Hey Rayek, I totally agree with your observations and opinion. Adobe's usual approach for product management should definitely not be applied to Figma ! I honestly hope Adobe has learned a lesson from their dwindling past in the area of web and app design, and decided to finally get it right. 

It's their last chance, for $20B...

[Peter Villevoye]

Do take into account one other aspect:

While the quantity in Figma's popularity is based on its free plan, the quality is in its splendid approach and technology. And while a part of the current community of users might oppose the acquisition, there's a much larger and commercially more interesting community to be expected in a couple of years, because UX/UI design is growing steadily. And those new users will be paying customers, who don't care about early adopters who were unhappy about past acquisitions...

With Figma, Adobe acquires very unique and strong technologies, necessary to retain (or should I say re-establish) their dominant position in design for all kinds of media.

[Thrasos · Accepted solution]

Hello ! I leearnec that Figma has been acquired by Abobe. To download Figma how do I proceed ? Is it present on the adobe suite or do I have to buy it via the usual platform ? 

[ProDesignTools · Accepted solution]

Adobe has announced the intent to acquire Figma, but this has not happened yet and the process will take months for the deal to close:

"The transaction is expected to close in 2023, subject to the receipt of required regulatory clearances and approvals and the satisfaction of other closing conditions, including the approval of Figma’s stockholders."

https://news.adobe.com/news/news-details/2022/Adobe-to-Acquire-Figma/default.aspx

So in the meatime, those who wish to use Figma should proceed as before; there are no changes at this time and the product is not (yet) available from Adobe.

[Thrasos]

Thank you very much for all these precisions

[addicted2type]

Not sure what will happen with XD but if you look at the Adobe Complete Product page Adobe XD is missing from there as well as the Adobe XD landing page, they may support it for a bit but looks like Figma or some new Hybrid will take over. If Figma replaces XD I hope its put on the Creative Cloud so I don't have to get another damn subscription to something. 

[thomashallgren]

If part of CC, then I can save money. What about non-designer access?

[Asif33907552t3ho]

never tried adobe XD but figma is so easy to use.. (NVM it lacks a lot of options)..

[thomashallgren]

XD is an excellent program and the development team was stellar. Unfortunately Adobe has a bias towrd building desktop applications. And that proved to be the downfall of XD. Adobe had to stop development of the Mac version to make a Windows compatible version. That cleared the path for Figma to iterate at an exponential rate. Had Adobe developed a web version of XD, it would likely have owned the UX landscape. Maybe Adobe will do that in the future. Given they were about to spend $20B on Figma, they would redouble that same investment to migrate all their applications to browser version. Lets hope!

[thomashallgren]

Short answer - you are right. Figma is the app for UX designers to use today. 

[Asif33907552t3ho]

No, its not dead. Not doubt that the figma is rather easy to use than adobe XD..