Dylan Field, Software’s Latest Billionaire

In recent years, some young designers have moved away from Photoshop and other complicated and expensive Adobe products and toward easier-to-use options from companies such as Canva Inc. for graphic design, Lightricks Ltd. for photo and video editing and Figma for crafting user interfaces. Software designers at Airbnb and Google use Figma, as do individuals building games, maps and presentations. It also has a loyal student following.

Adobe, which has been struggling to keep up with this growing crowd, made the purchase to protect its relevance. Wall Street panned it as too expensive, but the price was good news for Dylan Field, who dropped out of Brown University in 2012 to start Figma with a fellowship grant from Peter Thiel. The sale, which regulators still need to approve, should make him a billionaire. Last year, when his company seemed destined for an IPO, Field tweeted, “Our goal is to be Figma, not Adobe.” Now he says he’s selling to enhance the tool’s technical capabilities. The news disappointed the design community, which has expressed fears that a beloved underdog could become less innovative. Antitrust regulators are investigating the deal.