Adobe India, part of the $4-billion Adobe Systems, has said that its subscription model in the cloud has succeeded in drawing customers from the small and medium enterprises (SME) segment in India.
Adobe System India Managing Director (South Asia) Umang Bedi told Deccan Herald that the company underwent a transformational journey from being a mere software box selling company, to a cloud-based seller of software and services. “Besides becoming affordable, we gave customers the choice to renew the contract on a subscription model. We thus succeeded in attracting more SMEs and enterprises in India,” he said.
Bedi said that the company really turned its business model upside down with the cloud model. “We now have 4.6 million new subscribers worldwide for the cloud offering,” he said.
He said the company built an online store in India to serve the domestic market with local price points and succeeded in drawing visibility and awareness.
“In the last three years, we have added tens of thousands of SME clients in India. We also connected with small business in areas of jewellery, ceramics, pharmaceuticals, book publishing, small companies, fashion exporters, etc. We made their businesses affordable and efficient,” he said.
4.6 m subscribers
Adobe India’s SME segment business is in the top seven largest business units in this segment globally.
“SMEs have been a core part of our Creative Cloud product and go-to market strategy. We have a dedicated SME-focused offering called ‘Creative Cloud for Teams’ and a dedicated SME-focused go-to market partner programme called Adobe Partner Connection,” he said.
At a global level, in the past few years, Adobe has acquired over 4.6 million Creative Cloud subscribers across the Individual and SME segments and in Q2 of FY15, Adobe declared over $2 billion in creative annual recurring revenue, he said.
On the enterprise side, he said the company is focusing on IT, ITeS, telecom, manufacturing and pharma. “We are signing three-year long-term enterprise contracts. Adobe India is the second largest enterprise market after Australia in the APAC region, and would take leadership position in three years,” he said.
Backed by solid research and development push with direct collaboration from its Silicon Valley headquarters, Adobe India has made far reaching forays on the innovation front.
“Creative Cloud we launched globally in 2013, and later came to India. India was the first country to shut down our perpetual licensing for Creative Cloud by the end of the 2013. The company’s R&D leaders report directly to business unit heads at corporate. Adobe’s 26 products are made out of India, and we are increasing our patent registrations as well,” he said.