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Atlassian is acquiring The Browser Company

(www.cnbc.com)
520 points kevinyew | 5 comments | 04 Sep 25 12:12 UTC | HN request time: 0.02s | source
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thor-rodrigues ◴[04 Sep 25 16:27 UTC] No.45129033[source]▶
I’m not sure whether I find it more worrisome or fascinating that we live in a world where a company that, as far as I know, has never generated a single dollar in revenue has managed to exist for over five years, employ more than 100 people, and still get acquired for this amount.

This isn’t criticism or sarcasm — I’m genuinely impressed, but also very curious about the rationale behind it.

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colelyman ◴[04 Sep 25 16:41 UTC] No.45129191[source]▶
Agreed, to make it even more interesting Browser Company discontinued Arc earlier this year. So not only did they do all of the things OP listed, but also didn't have a current product when acquired.
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emoII ◴[04 Sep 25 16:46 UTC] No.45129257[source]▶
Where can I read about this? It still gets regular updates and is front and center on the browser company website
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1. sphars ◴[04 Sep 25 16:49 UTC] No.45129292[source]▶
This was their blog post back in May

https://browsercompany.substack.com/p/letter-to-arc-members-...

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2. swores ◴[04 Sep 25 18:33 UTC] No.45130637[source]▶
Ironic that I wasn't familiar with this company or their products before today, and having read about both Arc and Dia, including reading this blog post you've linked, the product that makes me want to try it is the one they've stopped developing...
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3. deinonychus ◴[04 Sep 25 19:17 UTC] No.45131158[source]▶
It's still worth trying and using. The developers consider it a "finished product" and I don't disagree. It does lots of small things well* that many browsers (even the self-confessed clones like Zen) don't do out of the box, if at all. Maybe in two years the browser will no longer be distributed or receive Chromium updates, but it exists and works fine now.

* For example, I get a lot of value from renaming my tabs and even replacing their favicons with emojis of my choice. Zen appears to have limited support for this.

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4. nofriend ◴[04 Sep 25 19:19 UTC] No.45131173[source]▶
It was popular but had no real route to profitability. Hence the acquisition.
5. swores ◴[04 Sep 25 19:22 UTC] No.45131210{3}[source]▶
Thanks, I will do