Amazon to buy startup focused on AI wearables

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By Greg Bensinger

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -Amazon has reached a deal to buy San Francisco-based Bee, a startup making an artificial intelligence-enabled bracelet to listen in on and transcribe conversations.

Bee’s $50 wristband can analyze and distill what it records to make summaries, to-do lists or other tasks. Amazon confirmed the deal on Tuesday following a post on LinkedIn by Bee CEO and co-founder Maria de Lourdes Zollo.

The deal has not yet closed and Amazon declined to provide terms. A spokesperson said Amazon will work with Bee to give users more control over the devices, which are set to automatically transcribe audio but can be muted.

“We imagined a world where AI is truly personal, where your life is understood and enhanced by technology that learns with you,” said Zollo in her post. She did not immediately respond to a query on Tuesday.

It was not Amazon’s first foray into wearables. The Seattle online retailer marketed a line of wrist health trackers called Halo but ultimately killed the project in 2023. It also has a line of smart glasses embedded with Amazon’s virtual assistant, Alexa, under its Echo brand.

ChatGPT parent OpenAI bought former Apple designer Jony Ive’s AI device startup called io for about $6.5 billion. Other startups have made early attempts at AI wearables, with mixed results.

In her post, Zollo thanked Amazon devices executive Panos Panay, suggesting Bee would join his group when the deal closes. Much of Amazon’s AI development is being conducted in its Amazon Web Services unit.

Bee was founded in 2022.

(Reporting by Greg Bensinger in San Francisco; Editing by Matthew Lewis)