I mean, framed differently:

> A material number of customers see Animate as a differentiator from our competitors, so even if we only provide support and security patches, the investment is justified for retention.

I don't really think there's a hidden agenda here. The announcement surfaced new information for them, they probably reframed their own analytics and saw insights that backed maintaining Animate as a result.

> The announcement surfaced new information for them, they probably reframed their own analytics and saw insights

That's such corporate-speak.

It means they don't know their customers at all and/or couldn't care less. They literally told major animation studios that the product is going to be dead in just a month.

And now they slightly backtracked the decision by promising vague support and bug fixes. Internally the product is already dead (otherwise there wouldn't be an announcement), teams disbanded and/or re-organized. They will fund a skeleton crew for "bug fixes", and the product will eventually be broken beyond repair in the same time frame as in the original deprecation notice.