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Adobe Sets Strategic Roadmap at Annual Financial Analyst Meeting

Press release from the issuing company

NEW YORK--Oct. 27, 2003-- At its annual Fall Financial Analyst Meeting today in New York City, Adobe Systems Incorporated delivered the company's business strategies for fiscal 2004 and beyond before an audience of analysts and investors. Adobe's executive team summarized the company's financial performance, outlined its strategic goals for the upcoming fiscal year and commented on customer demand for Adobe solutions platforms in the creative professional, digital imaging/digital video and enterprise markets. Highlighting the company's financial performance to date in fiscal 2003, which ends November 28, Adobe president and CEO Bruce Chizen said, "Despite the challenges faced by most technology companies during the past year, Adobe has reported year-over-year revenue growth in each of its last four quarters. Helping drive this performance was one of the richest product release cycles in our history, as well as the traction we made penetrating the enterprise market with our Acrobat-based document solutions." In addition, the company reaffirmed guidance for the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2003 and set targets for double-digit revenue growth in fiscal year 2004 based on the strength of its platform strategy for each of its key customer segments. Company Provides FY '04 Strategic Direction Adobe's comments to the financial analyst community outlined the company's strategic direction for fiscal year 2004: Enhance and extend the publishing platform for creative professionals Expand the Photoshop platform into the consumer digital photography market Enable organizations to migrate to intelligent document workflows "Adobe has transformed from a point product company to a platform provider," said Chizen. "This means that for many of our customers, Adobe technology has become mission-critical. They're now demanding the kind of technological innovation that results in even greater functionality and increased integration. Our mission now is to build on our three core platforms - creative professional, consumer and enterprise - to provide our customers with even greater value, now and over time. As we continue to execute on this strategy, we will partner with more companies, advance and support more industry standards and extend our core platforms into new markets." Creative Professional Strategy Adobe highlighted the critical role of the Adobe Creative Suite to the company's transition to becoming a platform for creative professionals. The all-new Adobe Creative Suite is a complete design environment that gives today's creative professionals everything they need to create and publish content faster, more easily and more efficiently than ever. By offering more value to these customers, the company plans to build on its already-strong customer satisfaction in this market, with more than 75 percent of creative pros currently using two or more Adobe products. Digital Imaging Strategy In the digital imaging market, where Adobe Photoshop is already recognized as the leadership brand, Adobe outlined its plans to extend the Photoshop ecosystem from professionals to consumers while accelerating the photography market's transition from analog to digital. Photoshop Elements 2.0 and Photoshop Album 2.0 are key components of this strategy for extending into the hobbyist and consumer market. A scaled-down Photoshop Album Starter Edition is available for free download, driving awareness for Adobe software capabilities at the entry point of the exploding digital photography market. Enterprise Strategy To further penetrate the enterprise market, Adobe highlighted its strategy to expand its server-based solutions to automate forms and document-intensive business processes for companies to transact business, meet regulatory mandates and reduce costs. Leveraging the ubiquity of the Adobe Reader, with half-a-billion copies distributed to date, the Adobe Intelligent Document Platform combines the technical strength of PDF with the company's support of open standards such as XML. "There's a whole new category of services that uses PDF technology to customize large volumes of documents and forms, make them 'intelligent,' and personalize them with secure delivery," said Chizen. "We see the demand for document services as an important market opportunity for us as we increase our presence in enterprise environments."