San Francisco startup Based Hardware introduced the launch of a brand new AI wearable, Omi, to spice up productiveness throughout the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas this week. The gadget might be worn as a necklace the place Omi’s AI assistant might be activated by saying “Hey Omi.” The startup additionally claims Omi might be hooked up to the aspect of your head, utilizing medical tape, and use a “mind interface” to know if you’re speaking to it.
The startup’s founder, Nik Shevchenko, began advertising and marketing this gadget on Kickstarter as “Friend,” however modified the gadget’s title after one other San Francisco {hardware} maker launched his personal Friend gadget and acquired the area title for $1.8 million.
In latest years, we’ve seen an explosion of units that use AI as their major interface. Rabbit launched throughout final yr’s CES, and generated a substantial quantity of buzz as a possible substitute to your smartphone. Humane, Friend, and the Ray-Ban Metas have been another AI units launched in the previous couple of years, which tried to point out what a brand new period of shopper {hardware} might appear to be. However, none of those AI units have fairly lived as much as their preliminary hype.
Shevchenko, a Thiel fellow with a historical past of eye-grabbing stunts, is taking a barely totally different method with Omi. Instead of seeing the gadget as a smartphone substitute or an AI companion, he desires Omi to be a complementary gadget to your cellphone that reinforces your productiveness.
The Omi gadget itself is a small, spherical orb that type of appears prefer it fell out of a pack of Mentos. The shopper model prices $89 and can begin transport in Q2 of 2025. However, you may order a developer model for supply right this moment for roughly $70.
Based Hardware says the Omi gadget can reply your questions, summarize your conversations, create to-do lists, and assist schedule conferences. The gadget is continually listening and operating your conversations via GPT-4o, and it can also keep in mind the context about every consumer to supply personalised recommendation.
In an interview with TechCrunch, Shevchenko says he understands that there could also be privateness considerations with a tool that’s all the time listening. That’s why he constructed Omi on an open-source platform the place customers can see the place their knowledge goes, or select to retailer it regionally.
Omi’s open-source platform additionally permits builders to construct their very own functions or use the AI mannequin of their selection. Shevchenko says builders have already created greater than 250 apps on Omi’s app retailer.
Shevchenko says Based Hardware has raised roughly $700,000, and he spent $150,000 of it on promotional movies round Omi shot in Los Angeles. The startup’s founder says he helped direct the movies himself. He says the startup is in talks to lift extra capital after this launch, nevertheless, Shevchenko has no doubts about spending this a lot on advertising and marketing.
“For us, the consumer base is definitely the core driver of the product itself. The extra folks that find out about us, the higher the product turns into as a result of we’re constructed on this open supply platform,” mentioned Shevchenko.
It’s unclear if the “mind interface” of Omi truly works, however the startup is tackling a reasonably easy use case to begin. Shevchenko desires his gadget to know whether or not a consumer is speaking to Omi or not, with out utilizing certainly one of its wake phrases. (TechCrunch was not in a position to try it out for ourselves right now).
But in a demo shared with TechCrunch, Shevchenko used the mind interface by closing his eyes and asking “Can you inform me about TechCrunch?” with out utilizing any of Omi’s wake phrases. While his eyes have been closed, Shevchenko says he was focusing very exhausting on the gadget on the aspect of his head. The gadget then provided a abstract of TechCrunch and advised Shevchenko how the publication can be related to his upcoming launch.
When Avi Schiffman launched Friend final summer season, Shevchenko launched a diss observe on X claiming his gadget was “the unique Friend.” Shevchenko now claims that Omi is a distinct sort of product from Friend, however he does say there’s an app on Omi’s app retailer that does precisely what Friend does.
