Critical.
Authoritative.
Strategic.
Subscribe to CIO Magazine »

Adobe said ready to drop mobile Flash

Company confirms plans to focus on HTML, cut 750 jobs

Adobe Systems Wednesday is expected to disclose plans for 750 job cuts, cutting its investment in enterprise software and a halt to mobile Flash browser development.

The job cuts and reduced enterprise software development were detailed in press releases Adobe issued late Tuesday. http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9221650/Adobe_to_reduce_enterprise_software_investment

Adobe reportedly sent an email to its developer partners yesterday announcing that the company "will no longer adapt Flash Player for mobile devices to new browser, OS version or device configurations."

Adobe officials could not be reached to confirm that email, but did disclose in a press release Tuesday that it will be "shifting resources to support even greater investment in HTML5," a Flash alternative. The company also said it would be "focusing Flash resources on delivering the most advanced PC web experiences."

Some analysts judged the move away from Flash on mobile as a vindication of Steve Jobs' criticism of the technology Flash as a drain on batteries and other mobile computing resources.

Gartner analyst Michael Gartenberg tweeted early Wednesday: "I think we've pretty much removed 'lack' of Flash as a negative from the iOS debate."

Many Android developers have viewed mobile Flash as important to the creation of gaming and other apps, making Adobe's move away from mobile Flash a major blow to them.

The Adobe announcements should be more fully explained by Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen and other company officials in a full-day meeting with financial analysts on Wednesday.

With the news, Adobe's stock price plunged by 10% to $27.21 at 9:30 a.m. EST today.

Matt Hamblen covers mobile and wireless, smartphones and other handhelds, and wireless networking for Computerworld. Follow Matt on Twitter at @matthamblen , or subscribe to Matt's RSS feed . His e-mail address is mhamblen@computerworld.com .

Read more about mobile and wireless in Computerworld's Mobile and Wireless Topic Center.

Join the CIO Australia group on LinkedIn. The group is open to CIOs, IT Directors, COOs, CTOs and senior IT managers.

More about: Adobe, Adobe Systems, Gartner, Topic
References show all

Comments

Post new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
Users posting comments agree to the CIO comments policy.
Login or register to link comments to your user profile, or you may also post a comment without being logged in.
Related Coverage
Related Whitepapers
Latest Stories
Community Comments
Tags: Adobe Systems, consumer electronics, Gartner, Mobile and Wireless, smartphones, Web 2.0 and Web Apps
Latest Blog Posts
Whitepapers
  • Enterprise Buyers Guide for Cloud Storage
    Customer interest in public cloud storage is increasing, driven by the promise of affordable, elastic storage for archiving, backup/recovery, and disaster purposes. To understand the types of offerings available and to assist buyers with purchasing decisions Computerworld has prepared a public cloud storage buyers guide.
    Learn more »
  • Enhancing Decision-Making, Cost-Efficiency, and Profitability With Predictive Analytics
    Today’s managers must always look at the past, present, and future. They need reports on past performance to improve operational efficiency. Business intelligence (BI) platforms such as Information Builders WebFOCUS, are providing a unified decision-support environment where managers can retrieve and analyze data about past, present, and future activities. In this paper, we will discuss the incorporation of predictive modeling capabilities into the WebFOCUS BI platform, and highlight how this advanced functionality can dramatically improve decision-making, thus reducing risk and costs while increasing revenue and profits.
    Learn more »
  • Unified Monitoring™ A Business Perspective
    The enterprise computing landscape has changed dramatically. Virtualisation, outsourcing, SaaS, and cloud computing are creating fundamental changes, and ushering in an era in which enterprises distribute increasingly critical IT assets and applications across multiple service providers.This paper explores today’s computing trends and their monitoring implications in detail. In addition, it reveals how a new monitoring paradigm architecture, that uniquely addresses the monitoring realities of today’s and tomorrow’s enterprises—whether they rely on internal platforms, external service providers, or a combination of both.
    Learn more »
All whitepapers
rhs_login_lockGet exclusive access to Invitation only events CIO, reports & analysis.