No guarantees on jobs or products: Adobe AU
Craig Tegel, Asia-Pacific managing director of Adobe Systems, said duplicate roles may be cut when the deal is completed and while both companies' full product suites would be available until then, he had no information about their longer-term future.
"When the transaction part is done and we start looking at the migration process, we will make sure we have a great team of people and we get the best from both sides," he told ZDNet Australia .
"That may mean where there are duplicate roles, the result would be some people will be leaving the company". Adobe Australia has around 18 staff while Macromedia has around five.
Tegel claimed it would be business as usual for the next eight months or so. "Customers today shouldn't be impacted at all," he said. "They can continue to take advantage of the product just the same, until the transaction is completed.
"Then we're going to start seeing some changes happening," he said.
The main areas of product overlap between the two companies are Adobe's Photoshop and Illustrator and Macromedia's Fireworks and Freehand. For Web design, Macromedia has DreamWeaver versus Adobe's GoLive product.
Macromedia Australia is understood to be proceeding with the local launch next week of the latest version of its Web conferencing product, Breeze.
Tegel reckons the combined Adobe and Macromedia entity is not likely to monopolise the market, adding both product-sets are already in a competitive environment.
"Both companies are in a leading position," he said. "We will continue to produce technology that will allow us to provide leading edge solutions strategically. I can't see a monopoly happening in the future," he said.
Adobe signalled its intention to acquire Macromedia for US$3.4 billion on Monday this week.