It's always a little disconcerting for a startup company when a technology giant wakes up one day and decides to enter your market. And that happened today for Seattle's DocuSign, a developer of electronic signature technology. Earlier today, Adobe unveiled a product that essentially mirrors what DocuSign has been doing for years.

Adobe notes on its Web site that its new electronic signature technology allows users to upload forms, contracts and others documents and get them signed within minutes.

Paul McNamara, Adobe's Entrepreneur in Residence in Cloud Computing, wrote in a blog post that the company already is a "market leader" in digital signatures with an industrial strength technology used by banks, the military and government agencies. Writes McNamara:

"The first digitally signed judicial order was executed using Adobe technology as was the FY 2011 US Federal Budget. We've built a digital signature capability into Adobe Acrobat and we have a server-side technology called Adobe LiveCycle that supports digital signatures in automated workflows. This type of digital signature requires sophisticated computer infrastructure that's often beyond the reach of small businesses and individuals. And therein lies the opportunity -- take our LiveCycle signature technology, put it in the cloud and simplify it to make it easy for everyday signatures."

Adobe has a $17 billion market value, so the fact that it is now moving onto DocuSign's turf is noteworthy. But DocuSign does have a few things going its way, including an investment and partnership signed last fall with the venture arm of the National Association of Realtors.

Real estate, of course, is a key market for any player looking to make inroads with electronic signatures. At the time of the financing, DocuSign boasted that more than 18,000 real estate agents had used the product. DocuSign also has been well funded over the years, raising some $30 million before the NAR investment. Its backers include Frazier Technology Ventures, Ignition Partners, Sigma Partners and West River Capital.

And it has experience in the market having executed over 70 million digital signatures.

We were wondering how the DocuSign team was feeling about the new competitor, but the executives were traveling today and not reachable. We'll update as we hear more.

[Via TechCrunch, which notes that Adobe's entrant into the market could impact EchoSign as well]