By Stephen Nellis
(Reuters) – Humane, the startup founded by ex-Apple Inc executives that raised $100 million earlier this year, said on Friday that it will use Qualcomm Inc’s chips in its forthcoming wearable device.
Humane has not given a release date or many other details for a gadget that it said on Friday will be called “Ai Pin.” Humane co-founder and President Imran Chaudhri demonstrated the Ai Pin earlier this year, showing an internet-connected device worn like a lapel pin that can answer spoken questions and project information on the user’s hand when held in front of the device.
Humane has taken a stance against Apple’s Vision Pro mixed-reality headset, with Chaudhri saying during his demonstration that “the future is not on your face.” Humane has also filed a trademark application for that phrase.
Because the Ai Pin does not have a traditional screen or keyboard, it relies heavily on artificial intelligence to interact with users in natural spoken language.
Sam Altman, the chief executive of ChatGPT creator OpenAI, is among the Humane’s many investors, as is Microsoft Corp. Humane is partnering with OpenAI for AI technology and cloud computing services, respectively.
Humane and Qualcomm did not give further details on which Qualcomm chips the Ai Pin will use, but Dev Singh, vice president of business development at Qualcomm, said the offerings would come from Qualcomm’s Snapdragon family of chips, which can power devices from smartphones to mixed-reality headsets, depending on the configuration.
(Reporting by Stephen Nellis; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
