Adobe Systems Inc is set to announce the first details of its K2 Quark killer professional publishing application, now named InDesign, at the Seybold conference in Boston today. President Chuck Geschke and CEO John Warnock will preview the product, along with AdobeÆs professional web publishing and product framework strategy, during their keynote this morning. K2 first came to light almost a year ago (CI No 3,390), and Adobe gave a hurried first preview just a week after Quark Inc launched what turned out to be an unsuccessful attempt to acquire the company in September. That time it used Apple interim CEO Steve JobsÆ keynote at Seybold in San Francisco (CI No 3,487). InDesign is expected to be launched during the third quarter of this year for both Apple Mac and Microsoft NT-based systems. AdobeÆs existing desktop publishing package, PageMaker, will have its prices cut and will be aimed at the lower-end of the market. K2 has more powerful typographic capabilities and other high-end functions PageMaker never had. Aldus and Adobe have kind of ceded the high-end market to Quark Warnock told Bloomberg. InDesign is the first step to get that market back. Adobe hopes it can benefit from its user base of Illustrator and PhotoShop users by offering an overall product framework to add integration capabilities between its various product lines. Last month the company launch a web publishing tool for professionals resulting from its acquisition last year of GoLive Systems Inc. Adobe is expected to directly target Quark users with a discount scheme for swapping to K2 that cuts the price from around $700 to $300, and the package will support Quark keyboard commands.
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