Adobe’s Macromedia Acquisition Targets Microsoft

“At its simplest level, Adobe wants to get into a new content type,” said Connie Moore, an analyst at Forrester Research. “At a more strategic level, this puts Adobe in a very different place in terms of competing against Microsoft or Oracle or IBM.”

Still, Adobe’s move is most likely a pre-emptive move against Microsoft, said Steven Ashley, an analyst at Robert W. Baird & Co. “It makes it harder for Microsoft to challenge Adobe,” he said. “As it stands today, they don’t compete very much against one another.”