(Bloomberg) -- Adobe Inc. tried to acquire design firm Figma Inc. for years before co-founder Dylan Field and the startup finally accepted, according to a filing with details about how the merger came together.

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Field, who is also Figma’s chief executive officer, met periodically since the startup’s founding in 2012 with Adobe executives to discuss strategic partnerships or a potential acquisition. He cut off merger discussions with Adobe, the top maker of software for creative design professionals, in 2020 and 2021, tweeting in January 2021, “our goal is to be Figma not Adobe.”

But in April 2022, Field suddenly was open to Adobe’s purchase offer, according to a timeline set out in the filing released Wednesday.

While negotiating with Adobe, Figma’s board directed Field to shop around for other acquirers. He met with Microsoft Corp. in May 2022 to solicit an offer as discussions with Adobe continued, according to a person familiar with the discussion.

Microsoft appears in the filing as “Party A,” an unnamed publicly-traded technology company. Figma and Party A entered a confidentiality agreement to share business information, but three weeks later, it told Figma it wasn’t interested, according to the filing. CNBC earlier reported that Microsoft was the unnamed company which Field approached. Microsoft declined to comment.

Adobe’s $20 billion offer was delivered in early July 2022. Field tried twice to increase the deal price, first to $23 billion, then to $21.5 billion. Throughout the process, Field met with Chief Executive Officer Shantanu Narayen, Chief Business Officer David Wadhwani, and Chief Product Officer Scott Belsky.