Surprised that Apple didn’t acquire Sky. Raycast might be an acquisition target if their code can become a service / extension for Spotlight in macOS. Usability win for macOS users if done right and Apple puts the right guardrails & privacy protections in place.
Maybe they tried but the founders rejected. The founders created another company that was acquired by Apple and worked there for a few years. Probably not a fun place to work for ambitious engineers who want to build AI products.
I feel like they just wanted to work on new thing to make macOS better with no guard rails. If Tim Pool was worth his salt he would hire them to let them do that, Apple needs a skunkworks for macOS. They should “overpay” them for it. If it yields superior internal products whats not to love?
Apple _should_ have acquired them. They've worked with the people behind it before (Shortcuts) and the demo videos I saw a few months ago were light years ahead of what Apple has demoed.