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Atlassian is acquiring The Browser Company

(www.cnbc.com)
520 points kevinyew | 1 comments | 04 Sep 25 12:12 UTC | HN request time: 0s | 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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hashbig ◴[04 Sep 25 16:49 UTC] No.45129300[source]▶
It was put on maintenance mode with minimal security updates to favour the development of their newer product Dia (AI browser).
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emoII ◴[04 Sep 25 16:57 UTC] No.45129400{3}[source]▶
Damn, I really appreciate the decision to do this in a new product. Arc is the best browser I've ever used, and I'd hate to see AI features forced upon me. Thanks Browser Company!
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hashbig ◴[04 Sep 25 17:56 UTC] No.45130156{4}[source]▶
I agree. I think Arc was the biggest innovation in browser UI since Chrome.

I think you will eventually have to switch because it will lack behind given that it's not their priority anymore. Zen browser seems like viable alternative but I haven't used it enough yet to know how well polished it is.

https://zen-browser.app

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1. jimmyshoes ◴[04 Sep 25 18:31 UTC] No.45130594{5}[source]▶
Yeah, this is the unfortunate part about products kept alive in maintenance mode in a rapidly evolving space.

I guess you could argue (as TBC did) it’s actually not rapidly evolving, and that gives it staying power. But eventually someone will reach parity and eventually eclipse the original product.

Hopefully Zen does that. I’m just tired of moving the same data to the effectively the same product run by a different team for no good reason.