The company behind the infamous Humane AI Pin is selling its business to HP for $116 million, a fraction of the initial $1 billion asking price. The company will also stop selling the AI pin immediately, and all already sold AI pins will stop functioning after February 28, 2025. The deal is also expected to close around the same time.
HP is buying Humane’s CosmOS, hiring its technical staff, and gaining access to more than 300 patents and applications in the process. According to a Humane, the tech giant is spinning off a new HP IQ division to help integrate AI into its existing product lineup.
According to a separate support page, the Humane AI Pin won’t connect to Humane servers; hence, features like calling, messaging, AI queries and responses, and cloud access will no longer work. Users are also requested to download any data they might have stored on the AI pin, including photos, videos, and pictures, before the company permanently wipes all user data from its servers on February 28.
There’s no plan currently in place for what happens to the $400 AI gadget, which was already selling nearly half the price from its starting $700 price tag, excluding the additional $24/month subscription required for it to function. Humane claims that offline features like “battery level” will still work, but “any function that requires cloud connectivity like voice interactions, AI responses, and .Center access” will not. This could very well be the end of the product.
As for refunds, Humane notes in a FAQ about the shutdown that any pins within their original 90-day return window will be eligible for a refund. Additionally, any customers waiting for a replacement charging case following the company’s recall in October 2024 will automatically be refunded for “the portion of your original purchase price that was allocated to the Charge Case.” The recall affected approximately 10,500 units.
The Humane AI pin was notoriously bad for what it did, even getting dubbed the worst product ever reviewed by tech YouTuber MKBHD. The company slashed the pin’s price in October 2024 but failed to sell enough pins to stay in business. Shortly after launching the pin at a steep $1 billion, Humane started looking for a buyer.
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