Generally speaking when software companies get acquired, the product dies. If a company is being bought by a bigger company, it only means that the profits are

Generally speaking when software companies get acquired, the product dies. If a company is being bought by a bigger company, it only means that the profits aren’t good enough for that company to go public, while at the same time a return is owed to its investors. It means that the company played loose with other people’s money and selling the company is the way out. In other words companies that are sold are companies that are struggling. And if that’s the case, the product itself will struggle to generate profits post acquisition as well. And I think there aren’t many examples that are an exception to this rule. We certainly see YouTube or Instagram flourishing as a result of scale. But those are the exception. GitHub was sold because GitHub wasn’t profitable or hype-driven enough to go public. It remains to be seen if GitHub survives. But back to a potential acquisition of GitLab, if it ever happens, I believe GitLab will die, with a community fork being the only way out. I’m writing this because HN has a fetish for acquisitions, which is interesting since to me an acquisition is often a death announcement.