This AI startup has raised $100 million in a Series C without a product

Humane Inc., a startup founded by former Apple employees, has raised $100 million in a Series C round and will release its first product this spring.

The company, founded in 2018 by husband and wife duo Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno, who both served as directors of Apple’s human interface team and operating system until their departure in 2016 has now raised a cumulative $241 million but has yet to disclose what it is building.

It only said it is creating a first-of-its-kind software platform and consumer device built from the ground up for artificial intelligence (AI).

In a news release, the company said the latest round of investments was led by Kindred Ventures and included significant participation from Tiger Global, Valia Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures, Forerunner Ventures, Lachy Groom, and Sam Altman, founder of OpenAI.

Alongside the investment, Humane also shared that it secured a roster of significant strategic technology partnerships and collaborators including OpenAI ChatGPT creator, Software giant Microsoft and Korean electronics giant LG Electronics Inc and Volvo Cars amongst others ahead of the reveal of its initial product offering this spring.

The startup says it will leverage these investment partnerships to deliver the next generation of personal technology and accelerate its mission to deliver the next era of personal mobile computing, which will be one driven by AI.