When Shuttleworth decides that he wants the Ubuntu brand to be nothing but Unity, he'll do what he has to in order to make that happen. All the baby buntus exist at his pleasure...just like Ubuntu does. If you don't think he would cut off official support for the other buntu's, remember back a year ago. When he changed the navbar controls to the left, he said it was to make room for important features in upcoming releases. When he kicked Gnome to the curb and forced Unity on the community he said it was because fuck you. If you think these are wild assertions, travel back in time 356 days and publicly announce your prophesy for Ubuntu and Unity. The outrage and shouts of "heretic" and "Charlatan" will drown you out completely.
Yet here we are.