Software maker Adobe Systems Inc said on Monday it agreed to buy multimedia software firm Macromedia Inc for about $3.4 billion in stock, in order to extend its lead in the market for creating and distributing digital documents. Adobe, best known for its Acrobat document-sharing software, said the deal would help it meet rising customer demand for audio and video documents and images that are compatible with hand-held devices. Macromedia also gives Adobe access to the dominant animated graphics software on the Internet, which is aggressively expanding into mobile phones.
Under the terms of the deal, Macromedia shareholders will get 0.69 share of Adobe, worth $41.86 at Adobe's closing price of $60.66 on Friday on Nasdaq, for each Macromedia share. That is a 25 percent premium to Macromedia's closing price of $33.45 on Friday, also on Nasdaq.