Apple Policy Said to Prompt U.S. Antitrust Complaint by Adobe

U.S. antitrust enforcers are considering an investigation of Apple Inc. following a complaint from Adobe Systems Inc., according to people familiar with the matter.

Adobe says Apple is stifling competition by barring developers from using Adobe’s products to create applications for iPhones and iPads, said the people who spoke on condition of anonymity because they aren’t authorized to discuss the case.

The complaint triggered discussions between the Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission over which agency should review the allegations of anticompetitive behavior, the people said. Neither agency has decided whether it would open an investigation, one person said.

Adobe and Apple have engaged in an intensifying public feud over which software can be used for Apple’s mobile devices. Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs panned Adobe’s Flash software, saying in an April 29 letter posted on Apple’s website that it has “major technical drawbacks.”

Adobe makes development tools for software makers to write applications that run on a variety of mobile phones and other handheld devices.

Last month, Apple, based in Cupertino, California, stipulated that software developers who write applications to run on the iPhone and iPad must not use technology from other companies to develop these products. The ban forces programmers to write applications that work only on Apple’s devices.

Adobe, based in San Jose, California, abandoned a tool that lets developers adapt its software for Apple products.

Declining to Comment

Justice Department spokeswoman Gina Talamona, FTC spokesman Peter Kaplan, Adobe spokeswoman Jodi Sorensen and Apple spokeswoman Kristin Huguet all declined to comment.

In an April 29 interview with the Wall Street Journal, Adobe Chief Executive Officer Shantanu Narayen said Jobs’s letter and Apple’s “recent behavior show their concern” that Adobe is pursuing its vision of providing content for “multiple platforms” on the Internet.

“The world is emerging where there are multiple devices that people are using to access the Internet and our customers continue to tell us they’d love to have a way in which they can get their content, their brand across multiple devices,” Narayen said.

Apple fell $4.95, or 1.9 percent, to $261.40 at 9:58 a.m. New York time in Nasdaq Stock Market trading. The shares had gained 26 percent this year before today. Adobe dropped 59 cents, or 1.8 percent, to $33.

To contact the reporters on this story: James Rowley in Washington at jarowley@bloomberg.net; Arik Hesseldahl in New York at +1- ahesseldahl@bloomberg.net

Shantanu Narayen, president and chief executive officer of Adobe Systems Inc., speaks at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco, last year. Photographer: Kim White/Bloomberg

May 4 (Bloomberg) -- Peter Cashmore, founder and chief executive officer of social networking blog Mashable, talks with Bloomberg's Margaret Brennan about prospects for Facebook Inc. Cashmore also discusses the dispute between Apple Inc. and Adobe Systems Inc. over Adobe's Flash video software. (Source: Bloomberg)

The Apple Inc. iPad to be sold in Wal-Mart stores. Photographer: Daniel Acker/Bloomberg