Adobe Enables Designer and Developer Innovation With $10M Design Investment Fund

Adobe announced the XD CC Starter plan, a free offering of the all-in-one UX/UI design platform. The XD CC Starter plan includes Adobe XD for Mac and Windows, mobile apps for iOS and Android, and services to empower users to design, prototype and share user experiences with colleagues.

With this announcement and the release of new features and enhancements, Adobe XD is the only cross-platform experience design platform to combine both design and prototyping with industrial-grade performance. And, as part of Adobe Creative Cloud, Adobe XD tightly integrates with designers’ existing workflows and top tools such as Photoshop CC and Illustrator CC. Underscoring the importance of this burgeoning category, Adobe also announced a $10 million design investment fund to advance innovation in experience design.

“UX design is one of the fastest growing segments in design,” said Scott Belsky, chief product officer and executive vice president, Creative Cloud at Adobe. “The new Starter plan for Adobe XD supports Adobe’s vision to give everyone—from emerging artists to enterprise brands—everything they need to design and deliver exceptional digital experiences and explore the rapidly expanding field of UX design with no financial commitment.”

Introducing the Starter Plan for Adobe XD 
According to data from Adobe, 87 percent of managers believe hiring more user experience (UX) designers is a top priority for their organizations, as they play a crucial role in developing world-class customer experiences. A milestone for the global design community, the Starter plan for Adobe XD provides free access to Adobe XD, enabling professional and aspiring designers, teams and students to learn, cultivate and apply their design skills. The XD CC Starter plan also includes Typekit and integration with Creative Cloud Libraries, making it easy to share and manage assets across devices.

$10 Million Fund to Empower Creative Innovation
To enable the vibrant ecosystem of partners, developers and startups, Adobe today announced the Adobe Fund for Design, a $10 million fund, distributed in the form of grants and equity investments. The fund will help designers and developers innovate in the world of experience design and leverage Adobe XD as a platform supporting tooling plug-ins and integrations withthird-party tools and services.

An expansion of Adobe’s ongoing investment in and collaboration with the design community, this fund will allow developers and designers to take full advantage of Adobe XD and integrate with the Creative Cloud workflows used by millions of creative professionals and top brands around the world. 

Workflow Enhancements in Adobe XD
These announcements align with the release of new features and enhancements in Adobe XD, including time-saving workflow updates that enable designers to go from concept to prototype faster. New Adobe XD features and capabilities are prioritized and introduced based on feedback from the design community and user requests.

Recent marquee updates include support for opening Sketch and Photoshop CC documents in Adobe XD, the ability to publish and share Design Specs (Beta) and integration with third-party tools such as Dropbox, Zeplin, Avocode and Sympli.

This month’s updates include:

·         Sketch and Photoshop CC integration improvements: First announced earlier this year, Adobe released improvements to opening Sketch and Photoshop CC files directly in Adobe XD. The release allows users to import stroke and image effects, and import Photoshop files more quickly to Adobe XD, as well as several conversion fidelity improvements when importing Sketch files.

·         Password-protected Design Specs (Beta): Users can enable password protection for design specs to restrict access. The user inputs a password in the Share popup window, before passing the links out, to ensure the security of proprietary designs.

·         Simple drag-and-drop options to swap symbols: Drag a symbol from the assets panel and drop it over another symbol to an artboard to update all copies of that symbol.

·         Paste to multiple artboards: Copy one element and then select multiple artboards and paste the element to each artboard.

Adobe is also facilitating learning and growth opportunities through an ongoing series of Creative Jams, where designers and design luminaries can share their unique design processes with each other. As part of this month’s updates, Adobe is releasing a series of free UI kits and resources for the design community, created by prominent designers around the globe, such as Daniel White, Ana Miminoshvili, Zhenya Rynzhuk, Steve Wolf and Mike, the designer behind Creative Mints.

Pricing and Availability

The Starter plan for Adobe XD is free and available immediately for all; users in an active trial of Adobe XD will need to update their version of the platform from the Creative Cloud desktop app or from xd.adobe.com to activate it. The free plan complements existing Adobe XD plans, including for individuals, teams and enterprises.

The $9.99 Adobe XD Single App plan gives Creative Cloud members unlimited shared prototypes and design specs. Additional details on plan options and pricing for each tier are available on Adobe’s website.