Who owns the PDF format ?

The short answer is no one !

Adobe, the ISO, Tracker Software and Ghostscript - who and where do they fit in ?

Firstly let us just say - our products on not based on any 3rd party library - such as Ghostscript*  - see below for more info ...

The PDF format and how it came about ..
The PDF format was originally designed and maintained by Adobe and in rare 'philanthropic' gesture with shrewd commercial logic behind it - offered as an 'Open' format that any software developer could provide tools to create, modify, view or print - provided only that they adhered to the PDF format specification laid down by Adobe.

PDF stands for 'Personal Document Format' and owes much of its ancestry to the  Adobe Postscript Language used by printing, design and publishing houses the world over for many years as a means to allow the output of documents to a printer format with content far beyond the usual capabilities of early computers and printers.

The PDF format was designed to allow users to create documents that would be seen on one PC exactly as they were when they left the authors PC - without the need to worry about whether fonts and images and other content resided on the readers PC, as all the relevant fonts and content would  be contained in the file itself and not reliant on anything being installed (other than the PDF reader) to present the document in exactly the same manner it was presented on the authors.

Anyone sharing Word processing documents over the years can attest to problems which can arise from doing so where non standard fonts and images etc have not been provided - or even document style templates differ - when using the same software. Further if you wanted to read a document created by a word processing program - a license was always required to have that same program installed on the viewers PC - then along cam the PDF format and the FREE Acrobat Reader and everything changed ...

PDF is now without argument the premier and dominant format for sharing documents the world over - and has created a multi billion $ market  - of which Adobe are the undisputed leaders (for now at least) - shrewd marketing indeed !

in the late 1990's and early years of the new millennium, Adobe started to face some criticism that they were beginning to place obstacles in the way of third party software developers by making some functionality difficult or even proprietary as they not only provided virtually the only PDF reader available - but also wrote the PDF format specification and whilst the format may be open - this included content and  functionality of some types that would be recognized by Adobe's FREE Reader only if an expensive 'Certificate' from Adobe  had been acquired -  it is perhaps as a consequence of this mounting criticism that Adobe handed finally over the stewardship of the PDF format and its future direction to the ISO (International Standards Organization).

*What is Ghostscript ? 
Ghostscript is an open source PDF library created and maintained by willing volunteers and others to create and modify PDF files, most free and cheap PDF creation tools use this library for the basis of their products as generally speaking they need pay no Royalties for its use.

Where do fit in ?
PDF-XChange and PDF-Tools are not based on Ghostscript or any other 3rd party Library - but entirely the product of Tracker Software Products (Canada) Ltd. Our software engineers have created product libraries and Tool-sets to make, modify, view and print PDF files to standards beyond that of any free product and we believe our products to be amongst the most robust and feature rich of any available. 

**ISO - The international Standards Organization which assumed from Adobe some years ago the responsibility to lay down and oversee the PDF format as an open standard format. Adobe were were the original designers and authors of the PDF format and provided it as an open source format to assist in its acceptance by 'third party' software developers and end users. It is now the Open Document Format of choice largely because of this fact.

Any Software company has the right to create and offer PDF format tools and applications without reference to Adobe or the ISO on the basis that they will adhere to the standards of the format originally laid down and specified by Adobe and now maintained by the ISO.