Adobe to Publish its Proprietary Font Format Specifications

PostScript Developer to Offer Open Font Technology

San Francisco, CA. (September 20, 1989)- Adobe Systems Incorporated has announced plans to publish the complete specifications for PostScript language Type 1 format fonts.  Until today's announcement, Adobe has licensed tools to major type foundries for developing Type 1 format font software, but retained the specifications as its own. Today's announcement makes Adobe's entire PostScript strategy an open technology, designed to benefit developers and end users alike.  The announcement was made during the opening session of the Seybold Computer Publishing Conference and Exhibition, being held here this week.

"We will publish the enbtire specification of the PostScript language, including the Type 1 font format, thus making it a truly open technology," said Dr. John Warnock, Chairman and CEO of Adobe Systems.  "We will offer this as a complete specification suitable for international standardization."

"Adobe will compete on the excellence of its products and its implementations," said Dr. Charles Geschke, President and Chief Operating Officer, Adobe Systems.  "We are confident that the quality of our software and hardware technology, as well as our established service and support to our customers, will continue to make us a very successful company."

Adobe officials stated the documentation for the Type 1 format specifications will be published and available to the industry by the first quarter of 1990.

"Adobe and the PostScript language have served the printing, publishing, and computing industries exceedingly well over the last five years.  We have played a vital role in the evolution of electronic printing by enabling personal computers to achieve the same high quality output as high-end publishing systems," said Warnock.

Every major computer vendor, printer and typesetter company, font supplier and software developer supports PostScript technology from Adobe.  To date, there are over sixty Adobe PostScript printing devices on the market and over four thousand applications that support the PostScript language standard.

"PostScript is too important to the industry for us to stand in the way of a unified printing and font technology.  Multiple formats will only serve to confuse users and impede the progress of computing and publishing," said Geschke.

For more information, please contact Brenda Hansen, Adobe Systems Incorporated, P.O. Box 7900, Mountain View, California, 94039. Telephone: (415) 961-4400.

PostScript is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated.