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In case you ever find yourself with as much leverage as Figma seemingly had… always negotiate a break up fee to compensate for exactly this. T-Mobile famously

In case you ever find yourself with as much leverage as Figma seemingly had… always negotiate a break up fee to compensate for exactly this. T-Mobile famously got a $4B breakup fee after DOJ blocked ATT from acquiring them. That $4B was used to buy more spectrum and overhaul the brand, leading to huge growth to the point that T-Mobile is now a big 3 player (it used to be big 2 only). If Figma wrangles $2-3B cash out of this, they could probably take down the entire adobe ecosystem.

roflyear 4y ago
It would be wonderful if someone took down adobe.
deleted 4y ago
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maroonblazer 4y ago
Substituting one Goliath for another is not the future we should be interested in. I'd like to see a competitive landscape where we, the users of these tools, enjoy the benefits of healthy competition.
lotsofpulp 4y ago
T-Mobile US ($177B) even has a bigger market cap than Verizon ($162B) and ATT ($138B). ATT’s management has been garbage for the last 15 years.
- smcin 4y ago
  Post-merger/acquisition of Sprint, yes (initiated in 2018 and finally allowed by regulators in 2020). Interesting detail about the prior 2014 Softbank/Sprint bid to acquire T-Mobile: > "It was reported that... Sprint had insisted on a low termination fee to prevent regulators from being given an incentive to block the deal, as had occurred with AT&T's failed attempt to purchase T-Mobile." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merger_of_Sprint_Corporation_and_T-Mobile_US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merger_of_Sprint_Corporation_a...
  - hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
    I don't understand that. Why would a large termination fee be an incentive for regulators to block the deal?
    - vlovich123 4y ago
      Total guess on my part but the smaller party is “made whole” which is less politically problematic than if a large company put in a bid, regulators block it, and the insufficient fee harming the company is blamed on the regulatory activity instead of the insufficiency of the fee. Unless you’re asking why a small fee would hurt a small company. In that case my understanding is that acquisition talks really stall the business and defocus the company for a non trivial amount of time, not to mention that you’ve given a rival deep insights into your business that they can then use to go after you.
    - vxNsr 4y ago
      Because it causes a large amount of money to go to underdog with basically no strings attached. It’s essentially free money to the smaller party which they could use to increase competition.
    - smcin 4y ago
      It gives the regulators more leverage to demand concessions. Then the regulator ends up playing brinkmanship with the acquiring company. The US now only has three nationwide cellphone networks so there are lots of concessions that can reasonably be demanded. (They should have never allowed the number of carriers to be consolidated down to three, but that's another story).
j_crick 4y ago
> If Figma wrangles $2-3B cash out of this, they could probably take down the entire adobe ecosystem Do you think that just $2-3B would be enough to push for developing alternatives to at least Photoshop and Illustrator and Lightroom and After Effects and successfully going after their markets? During what timeframe? Doesn’t feel like it tbh.
- cmdialog 4y ago
  A lot of designers are already abandoning Adobe because they are tired of their garbage. Many of my peers have turned to Serif Affinity apps as Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign replacements and they do an incredible job. Nobody cares about Adobe on iPads, most artists are reaching for Procreate. Most of the issues involve sharing of files since Adobe has such a large share and their file types are proprietary. There are alternatives out there and Figma has a huge grip on web design among other things. Adobe has nothing good for web design. Nobody wants to use XD. So you can see that there is already strong push away from Adobe. I don't know if Figma is going to eat Adobe's lunch in the next couple years, but they will be poised to be competitive.
  - ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
    > Procreate Procreate is f**king amazing. The combination of the 12-inch (or, in my case, Mini) iPad (with PaperLike screen protector), Pencil 2, and Procreate is awesome.
    - cmdialog 4y ago
      High five, I also got iPad + PaperLike screen protector combo and it really is super nice
  - dikaio 4y ago
    Agree. Installing one adobe app requires the installation of their app manager which sits in the background. Also the one app installed, installs and creates about 10 different directories, excess junk, pretty much what adobe has become. Now they try to buy out brilliant apps like figma which will only kill the life of it IMO.
ido 4y ago
> If Figma wrangles $2-3B cash out of this, they could probably take down the entire adobe ecosystem. I think you highly underestimates how much lock-in adobe has (and intentionally pushed, e.g. by doing what they can to prevent other programs from parsing their file formats, similar to what Microsoft used to do but fortunately no longer does).
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]

roflyear 4y ago

It would be wonderful if someone took down adobe.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

maroonblazer 4y ago

Substituting one Goliath for another is not the future we should be interested in. I'd like to see a competitive landscape where we, the users of these tools, enjoy the benefits of healthy competition.

lotsofpulp 4y ago

T-Mobile US ($177B) even has a bigger market cap than Verizon ($162B) and ATT ($138B). ATT’s management has been garbage for the last 15 years.

smcin 4y ago
Post-merger/acquisition of Sprint, yes (initiated in 2018 and finally allowed by regulators in 2020). Interesting detail about the prior 2014 Softbank/Sprint bid to acquire T-Mobile: > "It was reported that... Sprint had insisted on a low termination fee to prevent regulators from being given an incentive to block the deal, as had occurred with AT&T's failed attempt to purchase T-Mobile." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merger_of_Sprint_Corporation_and_T-Mobile_US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merger_of_Sprint_Corporation_a...
- hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
  I don't understand that. Why would a large termination fee be an incentive for regulators to block the deal?
  - vlovich123 4y ago
    Total guess on my part but the smaller party is “made whole” which is less politically problematic than if a large company put in a bid, regulators block it, and the insufficient fee harming the company is blamed on the regulatory activity instead of the insufficiency of the fee. Unless you’re asking why a small fee would hurt a small company. In that case my understanding is that acquisition talks really stall the business and defocus the company for a non trivial amount of time, not to mention that you’ve given a rival deep insights into your business that they can then use to go after you.
  - vxNsr 4y ago
    Because it causes a large amount of money to go to underdog with basically no strings attached. It’s essentially free money to the smaller party which they could use to increase competition.
  - smcin 4y ago
    It gives the regulators more leverage to demand concessions. Then the regulator ends up playing brinkmanship with the acquiring company. The US now only has three nationwide cellphone networks so there are lots of concessions that can reasonably be demanded. (They should have never allowed the number of carriers to be consolidated down to three, but that's another story).

j_crick 4y ago

> If Figma wrangles $2-3B cash out of this, they could probably take down the entire adobe ecosystem Do you think that just $2-3B would be enough to push for developing alternatives to at least Photoshop and Illustrator and Lightroom and After Effects and successfully going after their markets? During what timeframe? Doesn’t feel like it tbh.

cmdialog 4y ago
A lot of designers are already abandoning Adobe because they are tired of their garbage. Many of my peers have turned to Serif Affinity apps as Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign replacements and they do an incredible job. Nobody cares about Adobe on iPads, most artists are reaching for Procreate. Most of the issues involve sharing of files since Adobe has such a large share and their file types are proprietary. There are alternatives out there and Figma has a huge grip on web design among other things. Adobe has nothing good for web design. Nobody wants to use XD. So you can see that there is already strong push away from Adobe. I don't know if Figma is going to eat Adobe's lunch in the next couple years, but they will be poised to be competitive.
- ChrisMarshallNY 4y ago
  > Procreate Procreate is f**king amazing. The combination of the 12-inch (or, in my case, Mini) iPad (with PaperLike screen protector), Pencil 2, and Procreate is awesome.
  - cmdialog 4y ago
    High five, I also got iPad + PaperLike screen protector combo and it really is super nice
- dikaio 4y ago
  Agree. Installing one adobe app requires the installation of their app manager which sits in the background. Also the one app installed, installs and creates about 10 different directories, excess junk, pretty much what adobe has become. Now they try to buy out brilliant apps like figma which will only kill the life of it IMO.

ido 4y ago

> If Figma wrangles $2-3B cash out of this, they could probably take down the entire adobe ecosystem. I think you highly underestimates how much lock-in adobe has (and intentionally pushed, e.g. by doing what they can to prevent other programs from parsing their file formats, similar to what Microsoft used to do but fortunately no longer does).

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]