Adobe To Acquire Omniture For $1.8 Billion

The companies expect to complete the buyout, at $21.50 per share in cash, sometime in Adobe's fourth fiscal quarter ending in November. Omniture will become a new business unit within Adobe, with Omniture CEO Josh James becoming senior vice president of the unit, reporting to Adobe President and CEO Shantanu Narayen.

The acquisition marks a major expansion for Adobe, whose software products for creating documents and digital content include Adobe Acrobat, Photoshop, Dreamweaver and Adobe Flash.

Omniture's software is used to monitor and analyze how Web site visitors interact with a site's content. Adobe said the acquisition would broaden the range of products it can provide to Internet advertising, e-commerce and digital media markets.

Customers, according to the Adobe vision, will use Adobe's current products to create content for Web sites and then use the Omniture tools to analyze how viewers interact with the digital content, providing content developers with feedback.

"Adobe customers are looking to us for solutions to deliver engaging experiences and more effectively monetize their content and applications online," said Narayen in a statement. "This is a game changer for both Adobe and our customers. We will enable advertisers, media companies and e-tailers to realize the full value of their digital assets."

The acquisition also provides Adobe with a software-as-a-service platform, as well as Omniture's partner ecosystem and a recurring revenue stream from Omniture's subscribers.

Adobe could use a boost. News of the Omniture acquisition came the same day the company said sales in its third quarter ended Aug. 28 were $697.5 million, down more than 21 percent from the same period one year earlier, while net income dropped 29 percent to $136.0 million.