New Challenges, New Leadership

Shantanu Narayens appointment as Adobes new CEO came unexpectedly, and
equally unexpected was the resignation of Bruce Chizen. During his seven-year
stint as Adobes CEO (and fourteen years with the company), Chizen was
responsible for leading Adobes successful merger with Macromedia in 2005. Under
him, Adobe has come a long wayfrom simply catering to designers with products
like Illustrator to servicing a wide array of customers like creative
professionals and home users, and businesses as well.

After a seven-year stint at Adobe, Chizen has moved on, citing personal
reasons. Chizen quit the company at the time when the company was doing well
financially. However, with competition coming from Microsofts Silverlight, it
faces a rough ride ahead. Chizen, though, seems to be unruffled with the
competition, saying that he always had competition from Microsoft for as long as
he held the job.

The company, well known for its Photoshop picture editing software and
Acrobat program for creating and exchanging documents online, expects its
fourth-quarter revenue to be near the high-end of its target range of $860 mn to
$890 mn. The company expects its annual revenue growth to be about 13% for 2008.

Adobe continues to post double-digit growth, as it rides on a very successful
introduction this year of its media-authoring package, Creative Suite 3. So,
even with Chizens exit, analysts believe that the company would stay well on
track.

Shantanu Narayen, CEO, Adobe

The Top Job

Meanwhile, Narayens appointment reflects Adobes well thought out strategy
for ensuring a planned succession of the companys senior leadership. And he
seems to have been well prepared for the top job. In his previous role as COO,
Narayen was looking after the day-to-day global operations, overseeing all
product research and development. Narayen also spearheaded the acquisition of
Macromedia in 2005 along with Chizen. An alumnus of the Haas School of Business,
Narayen will take over as CEO and will also join Adobes board of directors from
December 1.

It has been a meteoric rise for this Indian American at Adobe since January
1998, when he joined as vice president and general manager of Adobes
engineering technology group. Within a year, he was promoted as senior vice
president, Worldwide Products, and in March 2001, he was promoted as executive
VP, worldwide product marketing and development.

Prior to being promoted as president and COO in January 2005, Narayen served
as executive vice president of worldwide products and helped drive Adobes
successful expansion into the enterprise market. In that role, he also led
Adobes efforts to build more integrated solutions across product lines and
successfully extended the companys flagship product lines to reach new markets.

Narayen, however, is no stranger to the digital printing market and began his
career as the co-founder of Pictra, an early pioneer of digital photo sharing
over the Internet, before joining Adobe in 1998. He also served as director of
desktop and collaboration products at Silicon Graphics and held various senior
management positions at Apple Computers.

A bachelors degree in electronics engineering from Osmania University,
Hyderabad, followed by a masters degree in Computer Science from Bowling Green
State University and a masters degree in Business Administration from the Haas
School of Business, Narayen wears many hats. He holds five patents to his credit
and serves on the Advisory Board of the Haas School of Business and University
of California at Berkeley.

Stuti Das

stutid@cybermedia.co.in