I also wouldn't be surprised if their venture capital angels had finally told them "enough, we're not going to keep throwing good money after bad indefinitely. We're cutting you off, get profitable."

Speaking purely as an armchair CEO, I think they could have done it by trimming the fat and making a few minor adjustments (a reasonable API price, for example). They have an income stream, they just needed to learn to live within that income stream's means. But modern capitalism's credo is "grow, grow, grow! Always grow!" And so that's not the direction they went, and ironically I think it's ultimately going to kill them.