Apple Computer Inc wants to sell part or all of another of its investments, the 16.4%, 3.42m shares, it holds in Adobe Systems Inc, which it bought in November 1984 for about $2.5m – against a current market price of $91m. As well as cashing in on an excellent investment, Apple says it sees this as an appropriate time to sell its Adobe shares because Apple’s current development directions are diverging from those of the PostScript developer – Apple says it is developing technologies that are competitive with those of Adobe, namely font software, which is planned to be included in the next major release of Apple’s Macintosh System Software – MacOS. Apple also says it is developing its own alternative interpreter for the PostScript page description language used in some models of its LaserWriter printers. It expects the new products to come out during the middle two quarters of next year, but intends to continue to support the Adobe interpreter and related technologies while customers request them.Apple will be selling the shares to Morgan Stanley & Co and Hambrecht & Quist Inc, and the two firms will resell them in a secondary public offering.
