Adobe and Figma planned to join together in a big deal where Adobe would buy Figma for $20 billion. But they’ve decided to cancel this plan. They say it’s because the European Union (EU) and the UK’s regulators made it too hard for them to make it happen.
Dylan Field, who is the Co-Founder and CEO of Figma, said, “We spent a lot of time trying to explain to regulators why this deal would be okay. But now we don’t think they’ll ever agree, so we’re stopping.”
Because they’re canceling the deal, Adobe has to pay Figma $1 billion in cash.
Figma has become really popular among designers, even those working at Microsoft, and it’s taken customers away from Adobe XD, Adobe’s similar product.
When they first announced this deal, many designers didn’t like it. They thought Adobe was trying to control everything in the design world. But Figma’s CEO said they wanted to keep running independently.
Today’s news will probably make most designers happy because the deal is off.
Regulators were worried that if Adobe bought Figma, there wouldn’t be much competition left in the design software market. They were concerned it could stop new ideas and improvements. Some big designers felt the same way.
But Adobe kept saying these worries were wrong.
The European Commission checked this deal closely and said it would really reduce competition in the market. But now that the deal is off, the Commission stopped investigating.
In the UK, the watchdog called the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said no to this deal because they thought it would hurt the design software market. They had some suggestions to fix it, but Adobe didn’t agree with them.
Now, both Adobe and Figma don’t agree with the regulators, but they think it’s best to keep going separately.
Even though they won’t join forces, Figma and Adobe might work together in the future for their users. That’s what Figma’s CEO, Dylan Field, said.
