Okay, so Thursday, we received news that Adobe Inc. just acquired Figma in a $20 Billion deal. Since then, the design community has been in total upheaval. On my Twitter feed, the memes and dislikes are almost endless (if you want some of those memes, here they are). I get most of it, though. I mean, we all love Figma, don’t we? We love it as it is, and we cannot imagine it as part of Adobe’s limited suite of applications. Designers (product designers especially) have been mourning since Friday. I’m not even sure my friend, Sunday Precious ate dinner, LOL. But the fear everybody has is that Adobe will change Figma. It scares people Adobe will introduce a subscription model to Figma; just as all the other software in their creative suite. Others are scared Adobe will ruin the collaboration that makes Figma our darling. Others simply hate Adobe buying out the competition. Everybody has one reason or more why they hate this buyout. But I don’t think it’s a bad thing. Here's why.
I took some time to read this official release from Figma where CEO Dylan Field explained some details of this deal and it cleared a couple of things up for me and right now; I don’t think this is so bad. At least not as bad as we think it is.
One core reason is that Adobe is letting Figma run autonomously. No interference, no rash changes. Dylan mentioned it in the release, and I believe Adobe would want to keep to that. I actually think Adobe bought Figma to learn closely from them. You don’t need a soothsayer to know that Figma is beating Adobe in the product design space and they might just have created the future of creative software. That collaboration that Figma has, that ease of file sharing, the community, imagine if all those features were available in all of Adobe’s other software. Just imagine! It will be wonderful. Seriously.
One might wonder if collaboration and seamlessness are what Adobe wants, why not just build it themselves? Well, I read this Twitter thread from Amal Dorai that basically explains why that is harder than you think. It's going to be a slow evolution process and instead of trying and failing and spending all that money, why not just buy these guys and let them help you? You also remember that last year, Adobe released a web version of Photoshop, much like Figma is web-based. How was that worked out? If learning from Figma is their game plan, which I think it is, then they need Figma in the building to make that happen. Also, Dylan says they have plans to integrate core Adobe specialties like imaging, photography, illustration, video, 3D, and font technology into Figma. So the deal might end up making Figma a whole lot better. Besides, this whole deal will not take effect until 2023, and that's enough time for us to get some more details about what will or will not happen.
Some are also worried about adobe introducing a subscription model to Figma. Well, I cannot give you a guarantee of that, but Dylan said Figma remains free, at least for the meantime. So, guys, this is not as bad as we think it is. I actually believe we’re looking at the beginning of a new era of creative software where creativity is seamless, collaborative, and open-sourced.
What do you think of this? Do you agree with my opinion? Do you think this deal will ruin Figma? Please let me know in the comments below. You can also clap if you like this post.
