Adobe says it is moving to an online subscription-based model for the software package it sells to designers, Web developers, video editors and other creative professionals.
Adobe Systems Inc said on Monday that it will not release new versions of its Creative Suite software package. Instead, the maker of Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat is shifting focus to Creative Cloud, which makes its software available through a monthly subscription that starts at US$50 for an individual if they sign up for at least a year.
Adobe’s move is part an industry trend toward selling software as a subscription service rather than as a one-time sale item. Microsoft Corp, for example, makes the new version of Office available as an online subscription. However, the company still gives consumers and businesses the option of purchasing Office as packaged software.
“Customers have to come to terms with the end of perpetually licensed software,” IDC analyst Al Hilwa said. “Adobe is ahead of the game.”
Adobe senior marketing director Scott Morris said the shift will help the company respond to changes in the marketplace much faster. Adobe’s engineers, he said, will be freed up to release updates and improvements much faster than the company’s traditional 18 to 24-month upgrade cycle.
Adobe said its Creative Cloud service has gained 500,000 paying subscribers since the company made it available as an option a year ago.
Morris acknowledged that the change will be a “big transition” for its customers. He compared it to Adobe’s introduction of the Creative Suite package a decade ago. Until that time, the company had sold its software products separately, rather than as part of a set.
“One of the things that make us confident with this change is that customers who are moving to Creative Cloud are loving it,” he said, citing flexibility and lower upfront costs.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
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Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day