Tipping the Microsoft Cash Cow Could Be Adobe's Next Move

When considering what your spreadsheets and documents might look like on the always-on desktop of the future, don't leave Adobe out of the picture.

The software maker famous for Flash and Photoshop is poised to take the plunge into the lucrative world of office applications. It may sound far-fetched at first, but the stage is set for Adobe to flex its muscle in the office-app arena. The company already has a strong presence in business software with its Acrobat suite of products and interest in its new platform for web-enabled applications that run on the desktop is rising quickly.

According to Adobe group manager for platform evangelism, Mike Downey, it wouldn't be outlandish to predict the company throws its hat into the ring soon.

"Though we have not yet announced any intentions to move into the office-productivity software market," he says, "considering we have built this platform that makes it easy to build rich applications that run on both the desktop and the browser, I certainly wouldn't rule anything like that out."

Microsoft all but owns the space right now -- its Office suite consisting of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook is the die-hard first choice of the corporate world -- but Redmond has been slow to react to the growing popularity of web apps and alternatives to its stable of dinosaurs.

Google has already built an entire browser-run office suite that is limited but shows promise. And others, like OpenOffice's free software suite and Apple's revamped iWork 08 bundle, continue to put pressure on Microsoft's desktop dominance.

Enter AIR, short for Adobe Integrated Runtime. AIR (formerly known as Apollo) gives developers a way to take code written for the web browser and repurpose it for the desktop. But this is about more than building web apps -- applications created for AIR can be run in a desktop environment whether the user is connected to the internet or not, a valuable trait that web-based office apps like Google Docs & Spreadsheets and Zoho Office currently lack.

By supplying that missing ingredient, AIR apps can trump the current crop of Ajax-powered word processors and PowerPoint wannabes. But Adobe's platform also presents significant advantages over desktop office apps that could appeal to the younger, more web-savvy workforce.

AIR apps are built primarily using Flash and Flex, two of Adobe's web-presentation technologies that afford a visually rich user experience, complete with animated menus and actions more akin to games and web-based tools than staid productivity apps. Enhanced web connectivity allows for more sharing -- docs and spreadsheets can be instantly embedded in blogs, and users can easily add photos from Flickr or videos from YouTube to their presentations or documents.

Perhaps even more important is that AIR applications are platform-agnostic. They operate almost exactly the same on both Windows and Mac platforms with only small differences, keyboard shortcuts being the most obvious. Adobe expects a Linux version of the AIR runtime to be completed in the coming months.

It's this set of advantages that Adobe hopes to parlay into a position as both platform creator and application provider in the near future.

"We want to build a platform that lets any corporation build applications in the browser and on the desktop," says Downey. "And just like any of our customers, Adobe is planning to take this platform and use it to build applications as well."

via .wired