what about possible tax benefits? what about using questionable accounting, getting the money then stalling in court with expensive lawyers? with AI, all things are becoming possible it seems
The valuation and money raised by Humane are actually very similar to Essential Products. (Though I'd guess Humane has burned more of their cash than Essential ever did.)
I'd contend that the Essential Phone was a far better product than the AI Pin, and Essential ended up shutting down and selling the remaining scraps to Nothing for (presumably) pennies.
Coffezilla made a video on this company and their CEO. It makes total sense in that context. (That they're trying to make a quick exit before further things come to light)
If they get even remotely close to $1B, I'm going to rage quit my job and go shopping for black turtleneck shirts. Because that's basically all you need these days.
1 Billion for what? Do they have actually products? A revenue? What exactly has this much worth at a company which seems to be burned and roasted by everyone since the first moment they came public?
I received one of these as a gift from someone. I was obviously skeptical but started using it and there's definitely a few areas where it REALLY excels at. The team tried to do waaaaay too much here... If they had more time or less ambition I think this could have really been something neat. My fingers are crossed that like Apple thinks so as well...
It's a wearable like a watch, whose main purpose is to be a digital assistant using server-side AI. It has its own plan so it's always connected. The things I've liked that you can do with it are like:
* Take a photo/video with a couple taps
* Have it "see" the area in front of you and give you insight - e.g. "Look at the desk in front of me, find all the items on it and put it into a note titled 'My Messy Desk'"
* Find information for you and do stuff with it - get me the number for X and dial it. Or get me the number for X and add it to a contact labeled Y
* Play me classic rock songs that feature "sunshine" as the main theme
* Add to my X log, at the current date and time that Y occurred
* Find me 25 songs that match X and put them into a note in X order
* Find me places where I can buy soda at that are open at the moment nearby
* Review my X log, remove any entries where Y occurred and replace them with Z
* How long is the second movie of the one about the desert, and what's it named?
Imagine if your digital assistant didn't suck, but then scale back your ambitions a bit because it's early lol. It's neat. Could you replicate it in order ways that aren't a wearable? Sure. But it's a decent assistant, nice always-accessible camera, speaker for music, wearable for texts/calls/whatever and I like the location it sits at.
Since it's so friction-less, it's easier to be curious IMO.
So it's a gpt-4 device with a camera? It's like siri plugged to gpt-4. I can see the attraction (though would still prefer my phone) but then then don't have the "AI" anymore than anyone else in this field.
100% it should be an accessory. It's a bit weird to carry another phone around - it's gonna be a WHILE before this replaces them, if it ever does. But all the hardware is great and having that all in that pin location is pretty nice as well.
The thing that turned me off most about humane was what I perceived as arrogance from the cofounder in the Ted talk, passing off a hacked together experience as if it was a functioning product but pretending it was something more. The audacity!
…And I have to say, this seems pretty on-brand. You do you, Humane.
AI hardware has to be an incredibly tough space to be in. Things are moving at such a rapid pace that by the time you launch, you’re already out of date.
I agree, it's a backwards move. Smartphones already absorbed the functionality of discrete devices like cameras, music players, etc. Why anyone would want to go back to carrying more stuff is beyond me.
Well functionally it might suck a bit, but theoretically the idea of a laser is interesting, the design team in general is pretty good, I'm talking about aesthetics only here. Their device is beautiful. The team has an Apple flair certainly. I know I've seen the demos and it is surprising how slow and wrong it can be, etc. etc. But it's v1. The only good counter is they had a shit load of VC money, that's true. But still, I just don't think people should be quick to throw it in the bin. There's a baby in the bathwater, and one can't help but think if it only had a chance what could it have become.
What kind of potential are you seeing besides the cool tech factor? They have delivered on none of their feature promises. Is it the mysterious AI factor that leads you to believe that they will magically turn around a non-working product?
The value of this company is cash in the bank minus debts. So probably negative.