Email will be with us until the universe dies, so these startups are working to make it better

Ah, email. Why did you send my friend’s birthday party invite to my spam folder? Why do you make it so easy to archive an email when I don’t even know what that means? Why are you … blue now … Gmail?

Email is a necessary evil. So whenever I hear about startups looking to innovate on the decades-old communication tech, I’m instantly intrigued considering the huge number of potential areas of improvement. Plus, talk about a large TAM!

Startups have taken note. Boomerang launched its email productivity software in 2010, Superhuman has raised $108 million to help users get through their inbox faster since its 2014 launch. Trying to build a better email mousetrap isn’t exactly a novel concept, but could be big business.

I recently received pitches from two new upstarts, both of which launched their email innovations in the last year, that really piqued my interest. Let’s meet them.