Bee Secures $7M to Develop Wearable AI Assistant That Grows Smarter by Learning from Your Conversations

The rise of AI and large language models (LLMs) brings a transformative potential to our daily lives, enabling them to interpret larger contexts and effortlessly manage information. This shift has prompted numerous companies to develop wearable technology, allowing users to seamlessly integrate AI into their routines.

The latest player in this arena is Bee, which has successfully secured $7 million in funding led by Exor. The company aims to enhance its wearable AI assistant, designed to listen, learn about users, take notes, provide contextual reminders, and help manage tasks. Alongside the wearable device, Bee also offers a companion app for the Apple Watch.

Among the disclosed funds is a pre-seed investment of $1.5 million that Bee raised earlier. This latest round also saw participation from notable investors such as Greycroft, New Wave VC, Banana Capital, and Brian Bedol, a respected investor and former TV executive who founded several sports networks.

Co-founder and CEO Maria de Lourdes Zollo explained that while the primary focus of Bee AI centers on the software that drives the assistant, the development of a wearable device ensures that the app doesn’t monopolize the phone’s microphone. The wearable and app are capable of performing various tasks, but the startup's vision is even broader. Zollo envisions creating a "cloud phone" for every user—a digital extension of their smartphone with access to accounts and notifications. Currently, the device is undergoing tests to develop features like reading notifications, providing reminders for important messages, drafting emails or tweets, and offering shopping recommendations on demand.

At present, the device includes a mute button for recording but the company is considering ways to expand its functionality to trigger specific commands.

Opportunities and Roadmap

As generative AI remains an emerging field, questions surrounding its reliability persist, leading to some skepticism in the market that Bee AI is entering. Other startups like Rabbit have previously attempted to create AI agents for task completion, but early reviews indicate that these solutions still lack reliability.

Nevertheless, several startups are tackling similar challenges, including A16z-backed Limitless and Friend, which develop wearables promising functionalities akin to Bee but with different use cases. Zollo believes that as new AI models emerge, performance will improve, and Bee is taking a cautious path by focusing on mastering a limited number of tasks.

Zollo co-founded Bee with Ethan Sutin (CTO), who previously collaborated with her at the video chat app Squad, which he co-founded with Esther Crawford—also an angel investor in Bee. Both previously worked at Twitter, where Sutin served as an engineering lead and Zollo contributed to the launch of Twitter Spaces.

The company’s investors express confidence in the team's capabilities. Ian Sigalow, managing partner at Greycroft, emphasized the impressive potential of the founding team. "I focus on investing in outstanding founding teams. With Bee, you have members who excel in engineering, many of whom have experience shipping products to millions of users at Twitter," he remarked.

Sigalow also sees significant prospects in developing a product that facilitates effective transitions between hardware and cloud services, particularly with well-trained large language models.

Given the device's constant listening capability, privacy concerns will inevitably arise. Currently in beta, the product not only uses user interactions but also factors in conversations nearby to refine its learning. However, before its official launch, the company plans to eliminate the use of non-user voices unless explicit consent is given. Furthermore, Bee assures that its platform does not retain audio recordings; only transcripts are utilized to enhance user understanding.

Bee is set to retail at $49, accompanied by a monthly subscription fee of $19, with plans to accept orders before Black Friday. The company has also clarified that its name is Bee, providing an updated narrative to reflect this.