The CEO of American software company Adobe, Shantanu Narayan, will step down after 18 years in the position. Adobe shares fell 7% on the news.
The company announced this on March 12.
Narayen will remain as chairman of the board and will only step down once his successor is named. The board has appointed Frank Calderoni, Adobe's lead independent director, to chair a committee that will lead the review of CEO candidates.
As Reuters notes, the announcement of Narayan's departure creates a difficult situation for the company. The company is now threatened by artificial intelligence. The announcement about Narayan comes at a time when Adobe is investing in artificial intelligence, making partnerships and exploring acquisition opportunities to expand its leadership in design software.
Adobe shares have fallen about 22% since the beginning of this year after falling more than 21% in 2025.
In February 2024, Adobe released a new AI Assistant, which is powered by artificial intelligence. It can analyze text files and answer questions related to their content.
And a year later, Adobe released a free Photoshop program for smartphones, which supports artificial intelligence and integrates with the web version.