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It could be negotiated as an investment, but that only benefits Adobe. Figma wouldn't want it (would you want your biggest competitor to be an investor? they'd

It could be negotiated as an investment, but that only benefits Adobe. Figma wouldn't want it (would you want your biggest competitor to be an investor? they'd have information and leverage you wouldn't want them to have), and it defeats the purpose of a break-up fee (Figma negotiated for it because they didn't want to spend a year of their lives focusing on something that would benefit their competitor if it's all for nothing... Adobe gained a year, has a ton of information, and distracted Figma).

theultdev 3y ago
And in reality, Adobe actually lost progress on XD and Figma has come out with an incredible amount of features this year. Now Figma has an extra billion for development and Adobe has to start back up the thing they couldn't catch Figma with in the first place. It was pretty much a win/win for Figma regardless of outcome. Though this outcome is a win for Figma and it's users.
- matwood 3y ago
  > And in reality, Adobe actually lost progress on XD and Figma has come out with an incredible amount of features this year. Features and free advertising. Many people knew of Figma, but now everyone knows of Figma. It's the tool that was good enough to scare Adobe into paying 20B and stopped by regulators.
vlovich123 3y ago
Being an investor doesn’t necessarily entitle you to information/leverage. For example, Apple earlier had plenty of board members from competitors & they would excuse themselves from certain discussions. Similarly, an investment doesn’t guarantee you a board seat. So there’s all sorts of ways to structure things and it’s all a negotiation (e.g. the break up fee could have been a 2B investment instead or something). Anyway, I agree this turned out phenomenally well for Figma and if I were an employee I’d be really happy about how this all turned out both for Figma and the industry (modulo the delay in cashing out).
- invig 3y ago
  As a conflicted board member you would have access to the information, you just wouldn't participate in the conversation / decision making.

theultdev 3y ago

And in reality, Adobe actually lost progress on XD and Figma has come out with an incredible amount of features this year. Now Figma has an extra billion for development and Adobe has to start back up the thing they couldn't catch Figma with in the first place. It was pretty much a win/win for Figma regardless of outcome. Though this outcome is a win for Figma and it's users.

matwood 3y ago
> And in reality, Adobe actually lost progress on XD and Figma has come out with an incredible amount of features this year. Features and free advertising. Many people knew of Figma, but now everyone knows of Figma. It's the tool that was good enough to scare Adobe into paying 20B and stopped by regulators.

vlovich123 3y ago

Being an investor doesn’t necessarily entitle you to information/leverage. For example, Apple earlier had plenty of board members from competitors & they would excuse themselves from certain discussions. Similarly, an investment doesn’t guarantee you a board seat. So there’s all sorts of ways to structure things and it’s all a negotiation (e.g. the break up fee could have been a 2B investment instead or something). Anyway, I agree this turned out phenomenally well for Figma and if I were an employee I’d be really happy about how this all turned out both for Figma and the industry (modulo the delay in cashing out).

invig 3y ago
As a conflicted board member you would have access to the information, you just wouldn't participate in the conversation / decision making.