There have been noises from Microsoft going right up to Gates to the effect that they themselves are abandoning Vista. This would make the life of this product pretty short if it only targets Vista's flaws.

Also, only people forced to use Vista are using it at this point which boils down to employees of corporations with not-so-wise IT departments - not the prime audience for a startup product IMO.

I do think there is potential for money in the idea of building a layer on top of Windows that makes it more usable. Xobni seems to be doing exactly that starting with email. (I'm sure they are looking beyond email by this point).

got a link or cite for the "microsoft abandoning vista" thing?

if that happens, my evil glee my well burst out of my gut like a baby alien.

Depends on why users think it's intolerable, I suppose. The most common complaints I hear about Vista, even from casual users, are about performance, and I'm not sure what you could do about that.

It would not surprise me if there's a whole bunch of useless services running; disabling them might help.

http://www.blackviper.com/WinVista/servicecfg.htm

Disable UAC.