In Q2 of 2018 Adobe announced that it was acquiring Magento for a bit more than $1.5b. In the year since that announcement a lot has happened and Magento Commerce has been put on a fast track to compete with other enterprise e-commerce players in the Gartner Magic Quadrant. Yet the Open Source version is still proving very popular with startups as well as small and mid sized corporations. As a Certified Solution Partner, Accorin is well-positioned to provide general commentary on where Adobe’s efforts have been focused over the last year and where it might be going in the future (without disclosing any confidential information).
Why Did Adobe Buy Magento?
If you review the major players in enterprise e-commerce software (IBM, Oracle, SAP), it should come as no surprise that Adobe would make a play for Magento in 2018. Given Adobe’s recent pace of acquisitions in marketing and marketing automation software, and considering the ongoing race for all major software companies to get embedded into large enterprises with consolidated “suitesâ€, the acquisition made a lot of sense. Adobe was looking to enhance their enterprise offering, and Magento was independent and available as the e-commerce leader.
What Has Adobe Been Up To Since Buying Magento?
In this first year Adobe has let Magento continue operating as its own entity, but with additional marketing and sales horsepower. It’s clear that Adobe wants to maintain the “flexibility†and “extensibility†position that Magento has maintained in the e-commerce marketplace for quite some time.
It does not want to disturb the vast, worldwide community of Magento developers that has been cultivated over the last decade or so, nor does it (right now, at least) want to alter the development of the Open Source version of the software.
Magento Open Source is an important entry point for e-commerce merchants that need flexibility and customization. It’s the number 1 e-commerce platform in the world for startups that have any complex business requirements and / or complex integrations with 3rd party systems. Adobe wants to compete more directly with Salesforce and Oracle and it wants additional marketshare in the massive enterprise marketing suite segment. So it has positioned Magento Commerce as a leader and it is beginning to associate the platform to its new Adobe marketing suite products.
In terms of features, functionality and the value proposition of Magento, the focus over the last year has been on all that we know to be true in the era of Magento 2:
- Magento Commerce Cloud has leading native B2B functionality that allows an enterprise with both B2C and B2B e-commerce requirements to build truly “Unified Commerce†experiences (one platform for both B2C and B2B);
- Magento 2 is a vast improvement on Magento 1 for both customers and administrators due to the improved checkout experience, themes, reporting features, ease-of-integration, quality of extensions, content management capabilities and more;
- Magento 2 is a global business growth engine with features that enable localization and doing business abroad, while managing a complex business with the features and extensibility needed to grow;
- Magento 2 is hands down the best platform for complex e-commerce and global e-commerce. While it can be customized, it still has the power and ease of SaaS with its Magento Commerce Cloud PaaS (platform as a service) offering;
- Magento’s strong partnership program enables 3rd party technologies to integrate with the platform with ease: CRM, ESP, ERP – just about any class of software;
- Adobe is here to support Magento! In fact, Imagine (the Annual magento User Conference) is only going to get bigger and better under Adobe.
What Do We Predict Adobe Will Do With Magento Next?
In the second year we are going to see more of Adobe, the Adobe brand and positioning of Magento within the “Adobe Experience Cloud.†The question is will the Magento name go away and how will the marketing and value proposition change as Adobe evolves the Experience Cloud platform? We think the following will be key initiatives for Adobe-Magento next year:
- Adobe will change the name to Adobe Magento Commerce (AMC), or something similar;
- Adobe will position Magento within the suite of Experience Cloud products (Marketo being a key one that was recently acquired) and start hammering home the benefits for merchants that adopt the platform and commit to running their businesses on the Adobe Experience Cloud;
- Adobe will offer deals to existing Magento Cloud licensees for other Adobe Experience Cloud products;
- Imagine (the annual Magento conference) will be co-located with the annual Adobe conference;
- The Magento feature set and roadmap will expand with more B2B features and more features for companies to engage in expansion plans that include unified commerce;
- Magento will remain and move upward within the Gartner Magic Quadrant again;
- With the “sunsetting†of Magento 1, Magento 2 growth will explode and they will add some entry-level pricing for smaller companies which will further enable Magento 2 to compete in the SMB B2B market;
- Adobe Sensei – the company’s AI engine – is going to start having some real, practical integrations within the Magento feature set. This will enable enhanced personalization and a variety of automated customer management functions yet unseen in Magento.
Bottom Line
It’s been a year of change since Magento was acquired by Adobe but it’s a buyer’s market and it’s a great time to consider switching to Magento, especially if your e-commerce business is increasing in complexity and you’re growing rapidly. Adobe is only going to push harder on customers to integrate with their Experience Cloud but with the continued popularity of Open Source, Magento is going to remain a top choice for new e-commerce merchants, and they can always graduate to the Commerce Cloud and PaaS architecture as they grow.
If you want to discuss your future with e-Commerce, we’d love to hear from you. Get in touch!
