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hype hardware startupHumanehas denote plans for its first international market , inking a dealwith South Korean carrierSK Telecom .
The annunciation comes in short after the San Francisco - establish companyrevealed it was pushing backthe cargo ships date of its Ai Pin twist from March to mid - April in its domesticated U.S. market .
Founded in 2017 by former Apple executivesBethany BongiornoandImran Chaudhri , Humane hadraisednorthof $ 200 millionfrom backers let in Microsoft , Qualcomm Ventures and OpenAI ’s Sam Altman before anyone in the outside world knew what it was building . The party finallyrevealed all last June , and in the intervening months it tantalise more detail about the machine .
In a nutshell , Humane has created the “ Ai Pin , ” a wearable gadget and whole new form factor pack with sensors , generative AI smarts and a mini projector that beams information onto any surface .
The Ai Pin costs $ 699 , with a recur $ 24 monthly subscription that consecrate the user a earpiece figure and outright information to power as many AI - power queries they wish . Thispositions Humane as a mobile virtual web operator(MVNO ) , with T - Mobile serving as its launch partner in the U.S. grocery store .
Delays
However , while Humanehas given the earth glimpses of the Ai Pin , nothing has yet leave the factory floor for the consumer market — andwith the company announce a circle of layoffs in January , with long - standing CTO Patrick Gates also leaving his persona , it would be easy to believe that something was n’t quite right at the company .
But with a South Korea launch now on the agenda , in partnership with the country ’s expectant mobile supplier , this bodes well for Humane as it ramps up output in the add up calendar month . The partnership also extends beyond a simple MVNO tie - up — Humane says it ’s part of a “ strategical investment funds opportunity ” that will see SK Telecom license Humane ’s CosmOS , theproprietary AI - enabled operating system that powers the Ai Pin .
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It ’s not entirely clean to what extent SK Telecom might lean on CosmOS , but theannouncement todaysaid that the two companies will “ collaborate on new subscription offerings and create new tax revenue opportunities for an app - less OS and ecosystem ” for the Korean marketplace .
It ’s also not yet clear when the Ai Pin might make it to market in South Korea , but given the delays currently surrounding its U.S. launching , we maybe should n’t expect it too soon .
