Amazon is acquiring Bee, maker of a wearable AI assistant that listens to conversations

Amazon is buying Bee, a small San Francisco startup behind a $49.99 wearable wrist device designed to record and transcribe conversations.

Bee CEO and co-founder Maria de Lourdes Zollo announced the acquisition on LinkedIn, saying that deal will “help us bring truly personal, agentic AI to even more customers.”

“When we started Bee, we imagined a world where AI is truly personal, where your life is understood and enhanced by technology that learns with you,” she said. “What began as a dream with an incredible team and community now finds a new home at Amazon.”

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Bee is one of several startups developing wearables that listen to everything you say and turn recordings into summaries and insights. Bee also integrates email, calendar, contacts and more data.

Bee says it does not store audio recordings and uses the “highest security standards.” It’s also testing on-device AI models.

“We design our products to protect our customers’ privacy and security and to make it easy for them to be in control of their experience — and this approach would of course apply to Bee,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement to GeekWire.

Bee employees have received offers to join Amazon, according to the spokesperson.

It’s not clear how Amazon plans to integrate Bee into its existing devices or broader AI strategy. Other tech giants include OpenAI and Meta are developing personal AI assistant hardware and software products.

Founded last year, Bee raised a $7 million round from Exor, Greycroft, New Wave VC, Banana Capital, and other investors. The company is led by Zollo and CTO/co-founder Ethan Sutin. Both previously worked at Twitter and Squad (acquired by Twitter).