Adobe set on subscription-based 'cloud' offering

Adobe has decided to bet the company on its subscription-based 'cloud' offering, Creative Cloud (CC), moving all its R&D to focus on CC and away from Creative Suite.

The company announced its 'bold' plan to move away from perpetual licensing and boxed offerings – and, effectively, Creative Suite 6 – at the Adobe MAX Creativity Conference in Los Angeles yesterday.

Creative Suite 6 will continue to remain available 'indefinitely', the company says, but all new product innovation will be delivered 'exclusively' through CC.

Creative Cloud was launched in New Zealand in April last year, and Paul Robson, Adobe ANZ managing director, says the offering has proved popular.

He says 80% of ANZ customers purchasing from Adobe's website are choosing Creative Cloud over the more traditional versions of the software.

Adobe has begun rolling out POSA (point of sale activation) cards to New Zealand retailers, having trialled the system here with Noel Leeming and Harvey Norman.

Robson says POSA offers 'strong benefits' for retailers, who no longer have to invest in the software to stock or as much space in the store, instead paying a 'nominal' cost for the cards. “All the investment is in the placement in the store and the nominal cost of the cards,” Robson says. “Inventory does not tie up any cash.”

Robson says the company maintains 'a very heavy channel engagement' with retailers and with resellers and system integrators who will continue to handle Creative Cloud for Teams (CCT) and Creative Cloud for Enterprise (CCE).

“We are still very much a channel organisation. In New Zealand we only have a small team, and we rely on our partners to go to market.”

The company has Ingram Micro and Express Data as local distributors, and Robson says it has 'all the major' SIs and resellers.

Robson says the move to CC shouldn't be seen as a threat for resellers. “The great benefit of CC is that it provides what customers are asking for. They get technology updates and feature enhancements far more often than the 24 month cycle.

“And the natural end state is that there is more demand from the customer and happier customers – and that's better for the channel and for us.”

He notes that Adobe never shipped massive amounts of boxes for business and enterprise users – who instead bought paper licenses.

CC upgrade

Along with the announcement that it was moving on from boxed offerings came an announcement of a major upgrade to Creative Cloud, with new versions of Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator, Dreamweaver and Premiere Pro.

The online creative community, Behance, is now integrated with Creative Cloud so customers can showcase work, get feedback and gain exposure.

The new suite update is due in mid-June.