San Jose, Calif., (October 6, 1999) (Nasdaq:ADBE)--Adobe Systems Incorporated today announced that CyberTrust, InterTrust, Plug’nPay, Publish One Inc., SheetMusicPlus.com and SoftLock.com will begin testing and product integration of Adobe® PDF Merchant™ software and Web Buy, a feature within Acrobat® Reader. Adobe has been at the forefront of the eBooks market, assembling key publishing, retailing and technology partners to grow the new market. The partners announced today join more than 12 others which were announced in August.

"As a natural extension to our leadership in the publishing industry, we’ve taken the opportunity to gather partners and develop new ebook’s technologies that leverage the many years of content publishers have archived in Adobe PostScript and Adobe PDF,” said Joe Eschbach, vice president, ePaper Solutions Group, Adobe Systems Incorporated. “The success of this market depends on a broad range of components such as, standards and technologies that accommodate new business models, flexible distribution channels and the ability to deliver high-quality content over the Internet. We’re working with partners in the publishing industry to help grow this market and drive the implementation of new eBooks technologies that enable this industry to do business on the Web today."

As a leader in the eBooks market, Adobe has been actively involved with a number of initiatives, consortia and standards bodies that leverage our leadership in the eBooks market. Of most relevance are standards that enable publishers to properly tag data within documents, format content for any device, provide a flexible distribution model that protects intellectual property, and enable the viewing of highly complex graphics on electronic devices. Adobe is a voting member of both the W3C working group for the extensible Markup Language (XML) and the Open eBooks (OEB) working group. Adobe has also been instrumental in the development of the Electronic Book Exchange (EBX) and participates on the W3C working group for Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG).

In addition to today’s announced partners, Adobe is working with Barnes & Noble, Inc.; Everybook Inc.; Fatbrain.com; 1stBooks; Glassbook, Inc.; Iomega Corporation; Octavo Corporation; Pearson PLC; R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company; Salon.com; Seybold Publications; Simon & Schuster, Inc.; Xerox Corporation. These represent the range of publishers, distributors, retailers, device manufacturers, technology and service providers, each of whom maintains a specialized and important link in the publishing and delivery chain. The companies will begin testing and implementing Adobe PDF Merchant technology to provide titles to be distributed and sold via the Internet.

About PDF Merchant and Acrobat Reader with Web Buy
Adobe PDF Merchant is a server-based technology designed to be integrated into existing ecommerce and transaction servers. It manages encryption of PDF files and the distribution of keys to access them. To provide consumers with a mechanism for purchasing and viewing electronic content produced using Adobe PDF Merchant, Adobe is implementing a Web Buy feature within the free Acrobat Reader. Together, the new technologies will give publishers, distributors, retailers and consumers the capability to securely exchange electronic content. Acrobat Reader with Web Buy will be available in Q4 1999 and Adobe PDF Merchant in Q1 2000. The pre-release of the Acrobat Reader with Web Buy and a demo of the buying experience including downloadable electronic content is available today at www.adobe.com.

About Adobe Systems Incorporated

Founded in 1982, Adobe Systems builds award-winning software solutions for Web and print publishing. Its graphic design, imaging, dynamic media, and authoring tools enable customers to create, publish and deliver visually-rich content for various types of media. The company’s products are used by Web and graphic designers, professional publishers, document-intensive organizations, business users, and consumers. Adobe is the fourth largest U.S.-based personal software company, with annual revenues approaching $1 billion. It employs over 2,400 employees worldwide and has operations in North America, Europe, the Pacific Rim, Japan and Latin America. Adobe’s worldwide headquarters are in San Jose, California and its web site is located at www.adobe.com.