Man, what a sad end for Instacart. The leadership team that took over in 2021 absolutely squandered the amazing machine the founders had built, filling the top spots with cronies and sycophants, none of whom had very much interest in the actual core offering of Delivering Groceries. They brought Facebook-lite management and drove out the actual product and business acumen.

By the time the CEO bailed to OpenAI, the damage was done - billions of dollars of opportunity, totally wasted. She left an organization gripped with paralysis, apparently too broken to fix and remain independent.