Uncle Sam to block Adobe absorption of Figma over monopoly fears

[merricksb]

Discussion of Bloomberg source article four days ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34917743

(330 points/4 days ago/85 comments)

[barelysapient]

I'm a longtime Figma user and selfishly I hope they don't get sold to Adobe.

That said...The sale was rumored to be about $20b. Does anyone really think that Figma has any chance of producing a return to shareholders even close to that sale price even if they charge customers aggressively?

[andrewxdiamond]

Strangely enough every actor here is doing the right thing.

Adobe is serving their shareholder interests by munching up the competition, Figma is selling to Adobe because of the reasons you outlined, and the regulators are stepping in to represent the interests of the public.

This is very much the system working as-designed

[BoiledCabbage]

The US govts primary concern is not figma shareholders. It's US citizens as it should be.

The harm to citizens outweighs the benefit to shareholders by too much in this case to allow it.

[zamnos]

The question isn't Adobe will make back their money, though they will. The question is how much money they don't get because are customers using Figma and no longer have to pay Adobe.

[JKCalhoun]

When Adobe moved to a subscription model (and not a very nice one at that) I vindictively hoped that they would spiral down the drain to irrelevance.

Kanpai!

[duped]

> Does anyone really think that Figma has any chance of producing a return to shareholders even close to that sale price even if they charge customers aggressively?

They could pivot to selling drugs.

Point is, who cares? Shareholders don't have an inalienable right to maximum profits.

[tompic823]

When this deal was originally announced, Adobe's stock took a ~10% hit. Now that the deal is getting blocked, their stock is again taking a hit? I certainly can't claim to understand the public markets.

[patrickthebold]

Maybe it's: "uh-oh Adobe must be in a really bad position if they agreed to pay 20b for Figma". Followed by, "Uh-oh, the need to buy Figma but can't".

[Zetobal]

The first hit was from investors that didn't like the deal... the second is from investors that liked it. That the former won't come back makes sense and so does the market. Well at least in this case.

[edoggie]

Yet they couldn't be bothered to stop the merger of every major media company down to a total of basically three businesses.

[jeppester]

Mistakes were made, lessons learned. Hopefully there will be fewer of these mergers and acquisitions going forward.

[twoodfin]

Netflix, Amazon, and Apple?

[baron816]

Blocking acquisitions is such a double edged sword. Yes you protect competition, which is good. The downside is that you remove an exit ramp for startups, which limits the incentives for startup formation in the first place.

I have no idea how to balance this btw.

[xnx]

Adobe got lucky with this deal in a way that Musk could only wish for.

[solarkraft]

Wait, that state still works? Has Adobe forgotten to pay their LobbyCloud subscription bills?

[sleepybrett]

good, now do google and facebook