Adobe on Aug. 19 announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire cloud-based video collaboration platform Frame.io. The acquisition joins Adobe Creative Cloud’s video capabilities with Frame.io’s cloud-first workflow functionality to create an end-to-end video collaboration platform.
With over a million users across media and entertainment companies, agencies, and global brands, Frame.io accelerates the production process by enabling video editors and key project stakeholders to collaborate using cloud-first workflows. The combination of Adobe’s creative software and Frame.io’s review and approval functionality will deliver a collaboration platform that expedites the video editing process.
Video creation and consumption are experiencing tremendous growth. Video teams must produce an ever-increasing volume of content. Each video project requires various stakeholders, including video editors, producers, agencies, and clients.
Today’s video workflows are disjointed with multiple tools and communication channels being used to solicit stakeholder feedback. Frame.io eliminates the inefficiencies of video workflows by enabling real-time footage upload, access, and in-line stakeholder collaboration in a secure and elegant experience across surfaces, Adobe said in its announcement of the deal.
When the acquisition closes, Frame.io co-founder and CEO Emery Wells and co-founder John Traver will join Adobe. Wells will continue to lead the Frame.io team, reporting to Scott Belsky, chief product officer and executive vice president of Adobe Creative Cloud. Wells and Traver started Frame.io in 2015.
The transaction, valued at US$1.275 billion, subject to customary purchase price adjustments, is expected to close during the fourth quarter of Adobe’s 2021 fiscal year. Until the transaction closes, each company will continue to operate independently.The closure is subject to regulatory approval and customary closing conditions.
Strengthens Creative Cooperation
Collaboration is the next wave of creativity, noted Adobe. Digital collaboration is now the foundation of all creative endeavors.
“We’ve entered a new era of connected creativity that is deeply collaborative, and we imagine a world where everyone can participate in the creative process,” said Belsky. “With this acquisition, we’re welcoming an incredible customer-oriented team and adding Frame.io’s cloud-native workflow capabilities to make the creative process more collaborative, productive, and efficient to further unleash creativity for all.”
Adobe’s acquisition of Frame.io brings Adobe Creative Cloud’s collaboration services to video and builds on recent innovations for creative collaboration. These include Adobe Creative Cloud Libraries, Cloud Documents, Design Systems in Adobe XD, Adobe Stock, and Adobe Fonts. Those assets combined with Frame.io will make it easy for teams to collaborate across Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and other Adobe Creative Cloud applications, according to Adobe.
Video workflows must empower all stakeholders. The combination of Frame.io and Adobe, Creative Cloud customers, along with video editors, producers, and marketers will heighten seamless collaboration on video projects with Frame.io workflow functionality built natively in Adobe Creative Cloud applications like Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects, and Adobe Photoshop.
“Frame.io and Adobe share a vision for the future of video creation and collaboration that brings together Adobe’s strength in video creation and production and Frame.io’s cloud-native platform,” said Wells. “We’re excited to join Adobe to continue to drive video innovation for the world’s leading media and entertainment companies, agencies, and brands.”
Innovation benefits the video ecosystem. For instance, Frame.io customers and partners will benefit from the company’s robust plug-ins and third-party application support, along with the innovation generated by the combined Adobe Creative Cloud and Frame.io teams.
With the addition of Frame.io, Adobe Creative Cloud’s commitment to enabling collaboration across all stakeholders of creativity extends beyond Adobe’s applications to the growing number of third-party applications across the creative ecosystem.
Industry Overloaded
The continuing expansion of creative content has outgrown the industry’s ability to keep up with managing productivity, according to Anthony Welgemoed, CEO and co-founder of Ziflow. His company is an online proofing and collaboration solution with over one million users.
“The volume of creative content being produced still keeps increasing,” he told TechNewsWorld.
For example, a video ad stays relevant for only five days. All of these creative teams are having to do more with the same resource, he offered.
But technology has responded with new solutions, some of which are starting to include artificial intelligence and machine learning. These new tools coming to the market are helping creators produce content faster and better.
Some of these platforms are web-based and provide some of its features for free. Two such solutions he mentioned are Figma and Canva. Figma is a web-based graphics design tool with a real-time collaborative interface. Canva is a platform used by graphic artists to edit and create custom designs in a team environment.
But as competitors to what Adobe and Frame.io offer, such products do not address the biggest bottleneck content designers face, observed Welgemoed.
“The review and approval of this content leave great production teams with less time to be creative. So really, it is just a volume of content explosion that is still ongoing, as it has been for the last two decades,” he said.
Post-Production Video Team Solutions
Adobe’s acquisition of Frame.io will focus more awareness on the need for the industry to solve the growing content collaboration issues. More competition of content services is the endgame.
While Adobe’s latest acquisition will let it leverage Creative Cloud storage, other solutions are needed to help content designers with the reviewing and approval processes. Ziflow’s platform simplifies content review and approval with its online proofing software for marketers and creatives.
“We see two types of situations among content teams. Some design teams do not use anything at all. Others are still using back and forth email exchange,” said Welgemoed.
In most cases, content creators see Ziflow’s platform as a system of record for credit production teams. Ziflow has a copy of every version of content designers produce.
“We have every comment made by every content reviewer. So using all that data, we can start building models that we can then use to automate parts of that review process, and we believe this is where we can reduce that turnaround time very significantly by leveraging AI and ML,” he explained.
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