FutureWave Software, Inc was a software development company based in

San Diego, California San Diego ( , ; ) is a city on the Pacific Ocean coast of Southern California located immediately adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a 2020 population of 1,386,932, it is the eighth most populous city in the United Stat ...

. The company was co-founded by Charlie Jackson and

Jonathan Gay Jonathan Gay (born 1967) is an American computer programmer and software entrepreneur based in Northern California. Gay co-founded FutureWave Software in 1993. For a decade, he was the main programmer and visionary of Flash, an animation editor ...

on January 22, 1993. VP of Marketing was Michelle Welsh who also came from

Silicon Beach Software Silicon Beach Software, Inc., was an early American developer of software products for the Macintosh personal computer. It was founded in San Diego, California in 1984 by Charlie Jackson and his wife Hallie. Jackson later co-founded FutureWave ...

, then

Aldus Corporation Aldus Corporation was an American software company best known for its pioneering desktop publishing (DTP) software. PageMaker, the company's most well-known product, ushered in the modern era of desktop computers such as the Macintosh seeing ...

.MACROMEDIA FLASH BACK
Digital ArchaeologyPC Graphics & Video, Volume 6, Issues 1-6
Advanstar Communications, 1997Personal Computer Magazine
PC Communications Corporation, 1995 The company's first product was SmartSketch, a drawing program for the

PenPoint OS The PenPoint OS was a product of GO Corporation and was one of the earliest operating systems written specifically for graphical tablets and personal digital assistants. It ran on AT&T Corporation's EO Personal Communicator as well as a number ...

and EO tablet computer. When

pen computing Pen computing refers to any computer user-interface using a pen or Stylus (computing), stylus and tablet, over input devices such as a keyboard or a mouse. Pen computing is also used to refer to the usage of mobile devices such as tablet computers ...

did not take off, SmartSketch was ported to the

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for ...

and

Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and ...

platforms. As the Internet became more popular, FutureWave realized the potential for a vector-based web animation tool that might challenge

Macromedia Macromedia, Inc., was an American graphics, multimedia, and web development software company (1992–2005) headquartered in San Francisco, California, that made products such as Flash and Dreamweaver. It was purchased by its rival Adobe System ...

Shockwave In physics, a shock wave (also spelled shockwave), or shock, is a type of propagating disturbance that moves faster than the local speed of sound in the medium. Like an ordinary wave, a shock wave carries energy and can propagate through a med ...

technology. In 1995, FutureWave modified SmartSketch by adding frame-by-frame animation features and re-released it as

FutureSplash Animator Adobe Animate (formerly Adobe Flash Professional, Macromedia Flash, and FutureSplash Animator) is a multimedia authoring and computer animation program developed by Adobe Inc. Animate is used to design vector graphics and animation for televis ...

on Macintosh and Windows. By that time, the company had added a second programmer Robert Tatsumi, artist Adam Grofcsik, and PR specialist Ralph Mittman. In December 1996, FutureWave was acquired by Macromedia, who renamed the animation editor Macromedia Flash.

References

{{US-software-company-stub Defunct software companies of the United States Adobe Flash Adobe Inc. Software companies established in 1993 Software companies disestablished in 1996 1996 mergers and acquisitions Companies based in San Diego