Magento is on life support

Since Adobe purchased Magento there has been growing uncertainty in regard to its future. Many merchants have been left wondering about the longevity of their Magento solution, whether or not they should be considering a move, and whether there is much more to see from their investment. With this article I hope to provide some clarity on the current situation as I see it, and to help answer these questions. This article gives an account of the demise of the Adobe Solutions Partner Programme, as well as the Magento platform itself. This is from my standpoint as the leader of the digital commerce agency, C3, with over 15 years of experience working with Magento, and several years as an Adobe Commerce Solutions Partner.

In the early days following the acquisition not much changed; the product remained much the same, as did the people and support provided to partners and merchants. Then, with an escalating, and quite alarming rapidity, things began to change, and not for the better. As an Adobe  Solutions Partner, we (C3) saw a swift decline in Adobe’s engagement with us. First, we lost our partner manager; a huge, and unprecedented blow. Gone was our key contact within the Adobe organisation, with no prior warning. We no longer knew who to approach for any of our support needs - quite an unconscionable and unexpected change from such a strategic partner.  We were marginally placated being assigned a dedicated sales manager. They didn’t last long, as they were “reassigned” within a few months, leaving us with just an “admin team” for any administrative based queries. We were left completely in the dark as to the future of the partnership programme, as well as the products themselves. What we were sure of, was that this was not a positive sign for us, or for our customers.

The rhetoric coming from Adobe in the last year or so has been surrounding how well placed Adobe Commerce is to support large enterprise. At this point it became painfully obvious that Adobe were shifting their focus away from SMEs, to focus on big brand names - think the Best Buys of this world. Our customers largely fall into the SME category, and therefore we became concerned about the future of their solutions on the now-dubbed Adobe Commerce platform - previously Magento Enterprise. The shift to large enterprise fits with Adobe’s extended product range, which includes their Adobe Experience Manager, which comes with a hefty 6 figure annual licence fee. In an attempt to find out more about the future of Adobe Commerce, I attended various Adobe partner webinars which rarely, if ever, mentioned Commerce. The platform is now a smaller part of a much larger whole; and whilst I’m sure it’s a key feature in Adobe’s strategy, it is no longer a primary focus; more of an ancillary product to feed into and support Adobe’s cash cow i.e AEM/AEP.

So what does this mean for those merchants with an Adobe Commerce licence? For now, not much, as Adobe continues to support and develop the product. Looking further on, however, Adobe has made it abundantly clear that they are not interested in SMEs. I predict that in the worst case they will make the licence fee for Commerce prohibitive, either directly by upping the fee considerably, or indirectly by absorbing it into another product such as AEP, and forcing merchants to pay for a much larger licence. The best case is that they continue to allow SMEs to use the platform, maybe for a limited time, but introduce little in the way of relevant features or advancements. The most recent evidence to support this claim, is the downgrading of a huge swathe of Adobe Solutions Partners. With no warning and zero communication, partners noticed (by looking at the public Adobe SPP directory) that their partnership tier had reduced, in some cases going from Gold to Bronze, losing the associated benefits. Whilst this did not happen to us, as we remained on the Bronze tier, I know of many who were up in arms about this sweeping change. It is evident that Adobe has selected a few larger partner agencies to work with on their larger enterprise drive; all others have been left out in the cold.

Given all of this I strongly advise caution to those on the platform considering a lengthy licence renewal. Adobe evidently doesn’t care about you, or the partners that support you. No doubt this attitude will be reflected in the future direction of the platform.

Ok, but how about Magento Open Source? There are many merchants using this free version of the platform. Historically the free and paid editions - Commerce and Open Source, previously Magento Community and Enterprise respectively - have been very similar in terms of feature-set and functionality. In recent times they have started to diverge more significantly, with Adobe releasing new Commerce-only features such as targeted micro-services. Open Source, however, has been left with very little in the way of notable advancements. Prior to the Adobe acquisition, Magento always used to say that the Community Edition was their biggest competitor. However, they knew that the huge global community that it fostered was immeasurably valuable and was pivotal to their growth and success. It contributed in no small way to its widespread global adoption, and being recognised as the leading open source eCommerce platform. It drove innovation in a way a closed-source product never could.

The new direction Adobe is taking Commerce has seen a significant decline in engagement with the community. Adobe has killed off the Magento brand and, as a result, the ecosystem and community that supports it has suffered hugely from attrition. For merchants, this means fewer agencies and developers working with the platform, and a lack of innovation with the product itself.

It is clear that Magento’s days are numbered. For now, it is being maintained from a security standpoint, but I do not expect any further significant advancements. Furthermore, due to a lack of investment, Magento has already become stale. For example, the front-end is, and always has been, slow. Developers have had to work incredibly hard to overcome this limitation, which has become an increasing focus given how much emphasis Google places on speed when working out rankings. That said, its life has been somewhat extended by the community, who have responded to this major shortcoming. The folks over at Hyvä have engineered a new front-end from the ground up - it’s modern, and it’s fast - and there is no doubt that it has given Magento a new lease of life. The work carried out by Hyvä is to be applauded, as it has helped merchants stay competitive and relevant in the face of an increasingly aging platform. There is also Mage-OS - a “fork”, or copy, of Magento Open Source, created and developed by prominent members of the community who have also seen which way the wind is blowing. However, it’s in its infancy, and it is yet to be seen if it will gain any traction. My personal opinion is that these endeavours to prop-up and sustain the platform are sticky-plasters on a wound that is unlikely to heal. Hyvä especially is a valuable initiative; it is much needed life support for a dying platform, but it has no long-term future, and it will ultimately be turned off. It's time to let go, and move on.

So this leaves the question: what’s next? If you’re a merchant with Magento at the heart of your Digital Commerce offering, what should you do? This is a question that we at C3 have spent a lot of time and energy answering. The future success of our business, and those of our customers, depends on finding the right solution. A solution that has the hallmarks of what Magento used to be: powerful, flexible, customisable, with support from a global network of solutions providers and developers. The C3 team has spent months researching the increasing number of available eCommerce platforms, services, and technologies. Utilising our 15+ years of architecting, designing, optimising and maintaining eCommerce solutions, we have scrutinised every area and every option. As a result of our efforts, I am excited to announce that we have a strong, sustainable, and all around better solution to support our merchants, and indeed most SMEs, now and far into the future.

At the beginning of the year we embarked upon an internal project to bring this solution to life, and I am pleased to report that we have made excellent progress. So much so that we are planning on starting a customer project using this new approach in the coming months. The new approach brings agility, flexibility, and the benefit of bleeding-edge technology, to allow production of best-of-breed solutions. And all of this within reach of most mid-market merchants. Furthermore, as we acknowledge that Magento merchants have invested significantly in their current Digital Commerce stack, we have created a way to transition away from the Magento monolith without throwing it all out. 

As to the details, that's enough from me today, so ensure you subscribe below to avoid missing out on my follow-up, where I shall reveal all!