Adobe made a very bold move today, jumping head first into the web analytics and tracking market with its $1.8 Billion acquisition of Omniture, viewed by many as being the Cadillac of web marketing analytics solutions.
The Associated Press reports (via Google News) :
Adobe Systems Inc. said Tuesday it will buy the Web analytic software company Omniture for about $1.8 billion, giving the maker of content-creation software a way to let marketers monitor the effectiveness of such content.
San Jose, Calif.-based Adobe Systems Inc. said it will buy Omniture Inc. for $21.50 per share in cash, a premium of 24 percent over Omniture’s closing stock price Tuesday.
The announcement came as Adobe said it earned $136 million, or 26 cents per share, in the fiscal third quarter that ended in August, down 29 percent from the same time a year earlier.
Excluding one-time items, Adobe earned a profit of 35 cents per share, a penny above what analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting. The maker of Photoshop, Flash and Acrobat software says its revenue fell 21 percent to $697.5 million.
So what exactly will Adobe do with Omniture to integrate it into its suite of offerings? Or will they let the brand continue to run itself? [Hattip @ravenjon]
The adobe website talks about integrating content and analytics….could there be a DreamWeaver integrated with analtyics in our future?
Wow. Holy wow. Omniture is one of a handful of great enterprise level software plays. Nice pickup by adobe. $1.8 B. That’s 1800 MILLION for those who once thought only tracking ‘hits’ to a site was important. you can bet there’s a party goin’ on in salt lake tonight:)
Next questions – will adobe do crm, or will google do enterprise analytics?
Adobe jumping into the field of web analytics and tracking wow, it is an amazing move to jump in the entirely different field what they are doing!!!
Brave move ADOBE
$1.8 billion? Wow, these numbers just never cease to amaze me. I just hope Adobe has the focus to get the best out of the Omniture opportunity. We’ve seen many big purchases go ‘belly up’ online.
WebsideStory had Hitbox
Rebranded it to HBX
Visual Sciences bought WebsideStory
Omniture bought Visual Sciences
Adobe buys Omniture
Interesting. I think that story better than Allaire Homesite bought by Macromedia, then bought by Adobe.
I just don’t understand? What is Adobe plan with Omniture? This is not a market which they thrive, how in the world do they expect to keep up? I hope they do soon have it as a back burner project. Even though Omniture is great, I doubt it will bring the revenue stream Adobe’s other products collect.
Finally !!! Maybe just maybe we can track BS and Hype of Social Marketing to see if it measures up to real marketing or not.