Non-Mac but the CNET article mentions several Adobe products
Corel is looking to expand its graphics software business and steal a little attention from Adobe Systems and Microsoft with its acquisition Thursday of digital photo specialist Jasc Software.
The deal marks the first major expansion by Corel since it became a privately held company last year, upon its takeover by Vector Capital. Terms of the Jasc buy were not disclosed.
Jasc sells three versions of Paint Shop, a collection of image-editing, photo organization and other tools that compete with products such as Adobe's Photoshop line and Microsoft's Digital Image Suite.
Corel CEO Amish Mehta said the software maker would continue to sell Paint Shop versions as standalone products. However, it will also work on packaging Jasc tools with complementary Corel products, such as CorelDraw Graphics Suite and Painter, he added.
"If you look at the Paint Shop product today, it's already a pretty solid contender against Photoshop," he said. "If we add in functionality from CorelDraw and other products, that's going to make it even more compelling."
Adobe, which has long dominated the professional side of digital imaging with the full version of Photoshop, has expanded its hobbyist pitch in recent years with scaled-back versions of Photoshop and other products. "Our philosophy is to try to get it out to as many people as possible, and hopefully they'll stick with Adobe when they're ready for something that does a little more," Jim Mohan, senior product manager at Adobe, has said in relation to Photoshop Album.
Add the new photo and existing graphics tools to WordPerfect--Corel's productivity package that competes with Microsoft Office and Sun Microsystem's StarOffice--and Corel now covers most of the bases for consumer software, Mehta said.
"We're putting together a complete set of alternatives to Adobe and Microsoft for value-conscious consumers," he said.
Mehta expects the combination to be particularly compelling for PC manufacturers that want to consolidate the software packages they offer preinstalled on new machines. PC leader Dell, for example, already offers both WordPerfect and Paint Shop bundled with its Dimension consumer PCs.
"We already have a lot of bundled software out in the marketplace, and this is just going to make us even more competitive there," he said.
Source:CNET News.com article:
http://news.com.com/Corel+buys+photo+software+maker+Jasc/2100-1046_3-5410245.html?tag=nefd.hed
Author
avid Becker (CNET News staff writer)
To Our Valued Customers,
Since becoming a private company last year, Corel is a stable, growing organization. Offering our customers access to more top quality, competitively priced software products forms an important part of our current and future growth plans and I am pleased to tell you that today Corel acquired Jasc Software, Inc., the award-winning developer of the Paint Shop family of digital photography, imaging and graphics software. I am confident that this acquisition will deliver immediate benefits to you, our valued customer.
With over 40 million users in 30 countries, Jasc is one of the world's top providers of digital photography and imaging software. The addition of Jasc's flagship products- including Paint Shop Pro, Paint Shop Pro Studio and Paint Shop Photo Album- to Corel's graphics family means that customers will now have access to an expanded portfolio of award-winning software, spanning both the business and consumer graphics markets. In addition, Corel can now provide customers with a complete migration path from the most basic photo editing, organizing and sharing, to image improvement and retouching, all the way to advanced image editing and graphics creation.
For Our Customers: An Expanded Product Portfolio At Very Competitive Price Points
With the addition of the Paint Shop family, we can now offer you the most innovative, reliable, and affordable packaged software portfolio in the industry. Our products rival other brands in quality, performance and reliability but at a much lower cost to you.
Product Type Competitive Product Corel Product
Office Productivity Microsoft Office Standard: $399 WordPerfect Office Suite: $299
Graphics Suites Adobe Creative Suite Standard: $999 CorelDRAW Graphics Suite $399
Advanced Digital Photo Editing Adobe Photoshop: $649 Paint Shop Pro: $129
Digital Photo Management/Editing Adobe Photoshop Elements & Album: $149.98 Paint Shop Pro Studio: $79
We are thrilled to add the Paint Shop family to our growing portfolio of packaged software products and we look forward to meeting your business and personal software needs with this expanded range of affordable products. Also, you can rest assured that the combined development resources of Corel and Jasc will drive significant product innovation well into the future. For more information, please review the press release and FAQ.
Sincerely,
Amish Mehta, CEO
Corel Corporation
Source:Corel Corporation email
Corel is looking to expand its graphics software business and steal a little attention from Adobe Systems and Microsoft with its acquisition Thursday of digital photo specialist Jasc Software.
The deal marks the first major expansion by Corel since it became a privately held company last year, upon its takeover by Vector Capital. Terms of the Jasc buy were not disclosed.
Jasc sells three versions of Paint Shop, a collection of image-editing, photo organization and other tools that compete with products such as Adobe's Photoshop line and Microsoft's Digital Image Suite.
Corel CEO Amish Mehta said the software maker would continue to sell Paint Shop versions as standalone products. However, it will also work on packaging Jasc tools with complementary Corel products, such as CorelDraw Graphics Suite and Painter, he added.
"If you look at the Paint Shop product today, it's already a pretty solid contender against Photoshop," he said. "If we add in functionality from CorelDraw and other products, that's going to make it even more compelling."
Adobe, which has long dominated the professional side of digital imaging with the full version of Photoshop, has expanded its hobbyist pitch in recent years with scaled-back versions of Photoshop and other products. "Our philosophy is to try to get it out to as many people as possible, and hopefully they'll stick with Adobe when they're ready for something that does a little more," Jim Mohan, senior product manager at Adobe, has said in relation to Photoshop Album.
Add the new photo and existing graphics tools to WordPerfect--Corel's productivity package that competes with Microsoft Office and Sun Microsystem's StarOffice--and Corel now covers most of the bases for consumer software, Mehta said.
"We're putting together a complete set of alternatives to Adobe and Microsoft for value-conscious consumers," he said.
Mehta expects the combination to be particularly compelling for PC manufacturers that want to consolidate the software packages they offer preinstalled on new machines. PC leader Dell, for example, already offers both WordPerfect and Paint Shop bundled with its Dimension consumer PCs.
"We already have a lot of bundled software out in the marketplace, and this is just going to make us even more competitive there," he said.
Source:CNET News.com article:
http://news.com.com/Corel+buys+photo+software+maker+Jasc/2100-1046_3-5410245.html?tag=nefd.hed
Author
avid Becker (CNET News staff writer)To Our Valued Customers,
Since becoming a private company last year, Corel is a stable, growing organization. Offering our customers access to more top quality, competitively priced software products forms an important part of our current and future growth plans and I am pleased to tell you that today Corel acquired Jasc Software, Inc., the award-winning developer of the Paint Shop family of digital photography, imaging and graphics software. I am confident that this acquisition will deliver immediate benefits to you, our valued customer.
With over 40 million users in 30 countries, Jasc is one of the world's top providers of digital photography and imaging software. The addition of Jasc's flagship products- including Paint Shop Pro, Paint Shop Pro Studio and Paint Shop Photo Album- to Corel's graphics family means that customers will now have access to an expanded portfolio of award-winning software, spanning both the business and consumer graphics markets. In addition, Corel can now provide customers with a complete migration path from the most basic photo editing, organizing and sharing, to image improvement and retouching, all the way to advanced image editing and graphics creation.
For Our Customers: An Expanded Product Portfolio At Very Competitive Price Points
With the addition of the Paint Shop family, we can now offer you the most innovative, reliable, and affordable packaged software portfolio in the industry. Our products rival other brands in quality, performance and reliability but at a much lower cost to you.
Product Type Competitive Product Corel Product
Office Productivity Microsoft Office Standard: $399 WordPerfect Office Suite: $299
Graphics Suites Adobe Creative Suite Standard: $999 CorelDRAW Graphics Suite $399
Advanced Digital Photo Editing Adobe Photoshop: $649 Paint Shop Pro: $129
Digital Photo Management/Editing Adobe Photoshop Elements & Album: $149.98 Paint Shop Pro Studio: $79
We are thrilled to add the Paint Shop family to our growing portfolio of packaged software products and we look forward to meeting your business and personal software needs with this expanded range of affordable products. Also, you can rest assured that the combined development resources of Corel and Jasc will drive significant product innovation well into the future. For more information, please review the press release and FAQ.
Sincerely,
Amish Mehta, CEO
Corel Corporation
Source:Corel Corporation email
