Adobe’s Shantanu Narayen Is Stepping Down After 18 Years as CEO

Shantanu Narayen, who has sat in the position of CEO at Adobe for 18 years, is stepping down, he announced today on Adobe’s blog. He will transition the role to a not-yet-determined successor but will retain his position as Chair of the Board of Directors.

“This is not a goodbye by any means but a time for reflection,” Narayen writes. “What attracted me to Adobe 28 years ago was our leadership in creating new market categories, world-class products, a relentless desire to innovate in every functional area of the company and the people I met during the interview process. We have continued to create new markets, deliver world-class products, drive innovation in everything we do and attract and retain the best and brightest employees. Over this time, we grew from ~3K employees to >30K employees, delivered technology that touched billions of people as customers of our products or the digital experiences that our customers create, leading to our revenue growing from $25B. I am so incredibly proud of what we have accomplished together.”

Narayen oversaw no fewer than two major transitions for Adobe, at the helm when the decision was made to move away from the Creative Suite to the Creative Cloud and again more recently with Adobe’s push into artificial intelligence. Both of these moves were controversial, but it cannot be argued that his decisions have led to incredible growth and profitability for the company.

Even now, Narayen remains steadfast in the direction he has taken Adobe.

“The next era of creativity is being written right now — shaped by AI, by new workflows and by entirely new forms of expression. Adobe has never waited for the future to arrive. We’ve anticipated it. We’ve built it. And we’ve led it. What gives me the greatest confidence isn’t just our technology — it’s our people. Your ingenuity, resilience and commitment to customers are what will define this moment,” he writes.

Investors don’t seem pleased at the news, which makes sense given Narayen’s policies have been nothing but good for their bottom lines. Adobe’s stock has tumbled in after-market trading, falling from its close at $269.78 to $250.20 at the time of writing — a 9.3% crash. This, after already falling 1.43% today before Narayen shared his plans.

Image credits: Header photo by Brian Cummings for Adobe and combined with assets licensed via Depositphotos.com.