Making hybrid work (and life) a reality with technology

The hybrid workplace is full of opportunities to test out new ways of work, but it’s still young. With only a few years since its widespread adoption, there’s so much opportunity to innovate and optimize.

Adobe’s “Future of Time: Hybrid Workplace” study found that hybrid employees and managers who split time between home and office said they spend around 5-7 hours each week troubleshooting or setting up technology. That’s too much time lost to inefficiency and to me, it suggests it’s time for a growth spurt.

A common vision for the modern workplace

It takes a unique heritage and leadership in productivity to transform the modern workplace, because now more than ever, employees are collaborating and sharing information in the cloud via more devices than ever before – and it’s largely in the form of PDFs.

With billions of PDFs opened every year, Adobe and Microsoft file formats make up the vast majority of business files — and no two companies are better positioned to provide solutions to the burdens that come with ineffective collaboration at work and life.

Two years ago, we embarked on a new chapter to transform the future of work. We deepened our partnership with Microsoft to make the modern, secure, connected hybrid workplace a reality. Our combined vision to transform digital experiences is centered deeply on embedding our industry-leading PDF, e-signature, and document automation capabilities within the place people and businesses do their best work — Microsoft 365. Adobe’s comprehensive Microsoft integrations within Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive, and more allow users to enjoy the PDF and e-sign capabilities of Acrobat and Acrobat Sign without having to switch applications.

The breadth and depth of Adobe products like Acrobat, and partnerships with Microsoft, have helped drive significant growth of the business in the past year. When organizations use Adobe and Microsoft solutions, they see a 251% ROI, 20% increase in IT and security team productivity, and 15% decrease in time spent on data analysis, according to recent Forrester research.

Innovating where the work is – the browser

Building on our existing integrations, we recently took the next step in our strategic partnership with Microsoft by bringing Adobe’s industry-leading PDF, e-signature, and document automation tools directly to 1.4 billion Windows users worldwide through Microsoft Edge. As the global standard for creating, editing, and managing PDFs for nearly three decades, Adobe Acrobat PDF technology will now power the built-in PDF reader in Microsoft Edge —  allowing Windows 10 and 11 users to efficiently and effectively get work done directly within their web browser. This will give them a unique PDF experience that includes higher fidelity for more accurate colors and graphics, improved performance, stronger security for handling PDFs and greater accessibility including better text selection and read-aloud narration — all free of cost.

Users also have the option to purchase an Acrobat subscription that enables access to even more advanced digital document features directly inside Microsoft Edge via a browser extension. These capabilities include:

• Editing PDFs: Windows users can make changes to PDFs within Microsoft Edge by adding, deleting, or modifying text, images, and other content in the PDF while preserving the formatting and layout of the original document.
• Securing PDFs: Windows users can apply security features to PDFs within Microsoft Edge using Adobe’s advanced security tools. They can encrypt the PDF, restrict access, and set permissions to ensure that only authorized users can view, edit, or share the document.
• Converting PDFs: Convert PDFs to Microsoft Office files, images, and more.
• Organize and combine PDFs: Rotate, delete, extract, insert, and reorder PDF pages. Merge multiple files into a single PDF.

As the world becomes increasingly digital, Acrobat in Microsoft Edge means that users will have faster and more secure access to the critical document capabilities essential to productivity.

Moving modern productivity forward

This hybrid world has turbocharged the need to make the workplace modern, secure, and connected so that employees can thrive. It’s a critical focus for our business. Adobe Document Cloud, which delivers Adobe Acrobat, continues to be Adobe’s fastest growing business. Our momentum is reflective of the demand for digital tools that enable efficient and effective collaboration.

Digital work will only continue to grow as experiences are reimagined with a hybrid-first mindset. With over 180 million joint commercial active users, we and Microsoft are well-positioned to continue delivering on the ever-evolving needs of businesses and individuals, bringing continued innovation, efficiency, and productivity to digital work and life. We look forward to unveiling new solutions that set the bar for digital experiences. Stay tuned for what’s next.

Learn more about Adobe Acrobat and Microsoft.