This applies to the most and hardly any exception left. The moment a VPN company decides to become something "more" they would introduce new features, partnerships, adverts etc to please customers in whatever way they can... I mean this practice alone speaks more about them being just another company who keep pivoting into different roles over the time...
And to be fair, this also creates a data paradox for users as now as they get sold these "others" partnerships too and marketing skyrockets.
Talking about Mullvad. I remember back in the day, they all used to talk more about how inside of a VPN works and how they used to do this and that to stay ahead but after the pandemic, suddenly started different partnerships, spending ridiculous amounts of money on those huge advertisement banners, becoming more and recently the browser. Yes yes pros and cons sure but these never used to happen over before.
Things were simpler and focused towards VPN... I am old I guess. Sorry for that...