Humane execs leave company to found AI fact-checking startup

As Humane struggles to find its footing in the nascent world of AI hardware, two top employees have exited the company to found their own startup. It’s a story that, in some ways, echoes Humane’s own origin story, as founders Bethany Bongiorno and Imran Chaudhri left longtime roles at Apple to launch their own company.

Former Humane Strategic Partnerships Lead Brooke Hartley Moy and Head of Product Engineering Ken Kocienda are wisely staying away from the fraught world of hardware with Infactory, a kind of fact-checking search engine. The project is still in its infancy, but the founders spoke to TechCrunch about their plans — a dramatic shift from Humane’s pre-launch secrecy.

Naturally, AI will play an important role in the project. For one thing, Kocienda, who has his own 16-year history with Apple, began working in the space well before Humane’s launch. For another, it’s next to impossible to launch a startup in 2024 without some upfront AI pitch.

According to Hartley Moy and Kocienda, who now serve as CEO and CTO, respectively, one thing that will set Infactory apart from others is the knowledge of when to — and more importantly, when not to — use AI. Large language models (LLMs) will be utilized to create a more natural language interface with the platform, so users won’t have to type in various configurations of words in order to get the intended results.

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