I'm not a PM so I can't speak to the decision itself, but I don't think grafting on the Inbox workflow to the Gmail interface would have worked out. It would ha

I'm not a PM so I can't speak to the decision itself, but I don't think grafting on the Inbox workflow to the Gmail interface would have worked out. It would have made both of them very muddled, and given the impression Inbox has more flexibility that it really wants to give. Two apps using the same backend data (you can switch between Gmail and Inbox if you like) seems a better fit.