Adobe & MadCap’s Cold War: Market Share

eContent Magazine reports the shifting change in the Help Authoring Tool / content authoring market:

In 18 months, use of Flare has grown to 25% of the content authoring market, according to the 2007 WritersUA Skills and Technologies Survey, while usage of RoboHelp declined from 63% in November 2006 to 56% a year later. The company [MadCap] reports being profitable since its first month shipping the Flare product.

There are some graphs from the 2007 WritersUA conference which confirm this. Mike Hamilton and I discussed their growth in the December Podcast as well.

Sustainability? Innovation!

We’ve discussed their Web 2.0 Tech Support as a major competitive edge. Now they have the office space to expand, they have the budget to expand… What’s going to be next?

I’ve seen the new announcement for an upcoming workflow process that looks like it encompasses even more than Blaze by itself.

If MadCap is profitable now and still launching new products by the crateload does that itself qualify as a competitive edge?

I think that MadCap’s core focus on software development rather than expanding cubicles and their tight control of middle management has been key to the past two years of success. There’s one competitive edge.

Anthony Olivier, CEO, at one time was the eHelp CFO prior to his eHelp CEO position. He knows how to flip a dime about four times. The relocation to the 7777 Fay office was a coup as well; I’ve never heard of someone being able to MAKE money on an office move.

Where do you see the tipping point coming? Or will Adobe (NASD: ADBE) reverse the defections and keep selling its product in increasing volume?

After all, according to Vivek Jain, TCS Group Product Manager, Quality IS Innovation. :p