&gt; Yup. Acquired for $101M then subsequently shut down in 1-2 years (just kidding of course).<p>&gt;  hopefully we can become the next billion dollar company. If not, then it&#x27;s the other two options: get acquired or die.<p>No offense, but it doesn&#x27;t really sound like you were kidding. I have no skin in this game because I never used Mailbox and am content to continue using GMail, but if I was upset about this shutdown and in the market for a new email client that would be around long-term, your answer wouldn&#x27;t exactly inspire confidence. You&#x27;ve basically said you&#x27;re going to shut down (or get acquired and then, inevitably shut down) unless you hit the lottery ticket of a billion dollar company.<p>Speaking more generally, I think this sort of attitude is going to catch up with VC-backed startups sooner or later. Why would I make my workflow depend on a startup that is, in all likelihood, going to either shut down or get acquired and shut down? For anything with a high switching cost, using a product from a VC-backed startup that has this outlook is just going to cause me problems later if I get dependent on it.<p>I think a lot of companies would do better by their customers (and themselves) if they instead looked for a more sustainable business model. But there isn&#x27;t as much of a lottery ticket in those businesses, so I can see why some founders avoid it.