👉 Background: Atlassian was founded in Sydney in 2002 by Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar. Since then, it has grown into a NASDAQ listed tech behemoth that is best known for its project tracking software Jira. It acquired the to-do list tool Trello in 2017, and then Loom, the video-communication tech company, in 2023 for $975 million.

‍👉 What happened: Atlassian’s share price has fallen more than 30% this year after investors have been asking the big questions on revenue, growth and profitability. But now, Atlassian has announced plans to acquire The Browser Company for $936 million (the company behind browsers called Dia and Arc).

👉 What else: Atlassian has called the acquisition a “trust play”. It's betting that its enterprise customers will pay for secure, AI-enabled browsers built for work. So they are entering the browser space before Google edges into the project-tracking world.

‍What's the key learning?

‍💡The battleground in tech isn’t just about who builds the best app, it’s about who owns the entry point to your workday.

💡Many tech companies see the browser as that front door, which is why Google worked so hard on getting people using Chrome over the past two decades. In fact, Google dominates in the browser space with nearly 68% market share, followed by Safari with ~20%, and then Microsoft’s Edge with ~6%.

💡If users start their day in Google Chrome or Safari, then Google and Apple can push their own productivity tools and AI features first. But if Atlassian controls the browser, it can control the flow of attention, tasks, and data. However, the challenge for Atlassian will be getting its customers to switch to another browser, like Dia or Arc.