Another grand idea for ‘what comes after the smartphone’ has bitten the dust with the makers of the Humane AI Pin revealing the devices will stop working in little over a week.
The company launched the no-screen Humane AI Pin in November to much intrigue. However, after a torrid 12 months and limited interest in the would-be iPhone replacement, Humane has cut its losses by selling its IP to HP for a reported $119 million.
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The projector-laden wearable puck is clearly not part of the PC-maker’s future plans, so Humane has informed the few buyers who’d taken the plunge on the concept, that their devices are being shut down at the end of the month.
On February 28, at 8pm UK time, the company says: “AI Pin devices will no longer connect to Humane’s servers, and .Center access will be fully retired.” Furthermore, all customer data will be deleted from Humane’s services. If you integrated third-party messaging, calendar or music apps, they’ll be disconnected too.
In fact, all this Pin will do after the end of this month is let you know how much battery is left. The company is encouraging people to download whatever data they’d like to keep before the expiry date. HP, for its part, wants no part of the Pin itself but sees a use for the company’s intellectual property and talent.
HP says Humane’s “engineers, architects and product innovators” to a new team called HP IQ, which it describes as an “AI innovation lab focused on building an intelligent ecosystem across HP’s products and services for the future of work.”
The smartphone remains king
The search for what comes after the smartphone must go on. There seems to be no appetite among consumers for that future to revolve around AI glasses, for starters. As for these little AI pins like Humane and the risible Rabbit r1 rival, they clearly aren’t the answer in their current form. It appears the humble smartphone is destined to be our primary device for quite some time yet.
As for Humane, well, this must be some sort of record for Silicon Valley’s move fast and break things ethos. Launch a device in November 2023 for $699 plus a 24 month data subscription and kill it completely with a knockdown sellout 15 months later?
