relationship that we had built with our customers. We wanted them to feel that
a) they were given a decent deal and that b) they trusted us to lead them to
where they needed to go. So at that same conference, the organizers decided
very quickly to put an extra panel on the last day and have a live debate over
whether the attendees—and this was all the major players in printing and
publishing—preferred to have Apple and Microsoft take over their future or
whether they wanted to stay with Adobe. Before the panel started, the moderator
got up and said, “I’d like to get a feeling for what the sense of the group is
before we start this. I’d like everyone who wants Apple and Microsoft to succeed
in putting Adobe out of business to raise their hands.” There were a few
Apple and Microsoft employees in the audience, but out of about 1,500 people,
only a couple dozen hands were raised.
So that reinforced a message that John and I had always preached inside the
company about how to treat our customers. Listen to them very carefully.
Understand what their requirements are and what their needs are. Not necessarily
do what they asked us to do, but to have the vision to do more than they
expected. We had worked religiously at that. We had indoctrinated in all of our
employees that you treat a customer the way you’d like to be treated. That you
are responsible for that customer’s success and, if you fail at your job, you may
cause their business to fail. I think sometimes the cynics would look at that and
say, “That’s sort of goody-two-shoes. Maybe this guy’s reading too much of the
Bible or something.” But it’s just good business. And that event demonstrated
it; basically everybody voted for us. In fact, while there was a hiccup in the stock
because of the Apple-Microsoft announcement, our business never faltered.
Livingston: Why weren’t Microsoft and Apple able to make a competitive
product?
Geschke: They were mostly working on speculation of what they thought they
could do. When we were talking to Microsoft and Apple about licensing this
technology from us, we already had working prototypes. They were an example
of what a poor duck hunter does. They were shooting at where we already were,
and we were long past them by the time they were able to bring that product
out. It became basically irrelevant to the market.
Livingston: Was there ever a competitor out there in the early years that you
worried about?
Geschke: There were some. When we got our money for that original business

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