Australian based Canva has announced that it has bought the popular UK based graphic design software company Affinity which is responsible for Affinity Designer, Photo and Publisher.
Affinity Designer is one of the best graphic design apps for Mac and has proved incredibly successful because it’s available as a one-off purchase in an industry where subscriptions are the norm.
The company also makes Affinity Publisher which is also an excellent desktop publishing software for Mac and there’s also Affinity Photo which is an alternative to Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator.
The size of the deal has not been revealed but Bloomberg reports that it will be several hundred million pounds.
Canva is one of Adobe’s biggest competitors and the move will help it compete with the design software giant.
The natural fear for Affinity users though is that Canva will make Affinity products subscription only although in an FAQ on the deal, Affinity has stated this will not be the case:
Canva’s business model is subscription, are there any plans to change how Affinity is sold?
There are no changes to our current pricing model planned at this time, with all our apps still available as a one-off purchase. Existing Affinity users will be able to continue to use your apps in perpetuity as they were originally purchased – with plenty of free updates to V2 still to look forward to!
Update: In response to these concerns, Affinity has now released a statement pledging that Affinity will always offer perpetual licenses.
Canva has also stated that it intends to keep the Affinity products separate from its own product line but there will be some integration between the two.