Transcription and note-taking has emerged as one of the primary use cases for mobile gadgets as AI models drive voice-to-text technology. We’re even seeing some diversification, with startups like Plaud and Pocket which specializes in products that can record and summarize meetings. Others, like Friend, Omi and Amazon-owned Bee, are exploring things like pendants and wristbands to give people a way to record their interactions and daily lives.
There has been a bit of controversy surrounding this last aspect, as people understandably don’t want to be recorded by someone without consent. Call a startup Taya by former Apple design engineer Elena Wagenmans, tries to address these privacy concerns with a device that only records the user’s voice. As a bonus, the device disguises itself as a piece of jewelry: it’s designed to be worn as an elegant pendant.
Priced at $89 for pre-orders, the Taya Necklace features a button you can press to start and stop recording. the microphone is disabled by default. The startup is also shipping a companion iOS app that saves your notes and lets you ask questions about them through an AI-powered chat feature.
Unlike many of its older rivals, who build for a wide range of use cases, Taya focuses on ensuring that the device only captures the user’s voice. On integration, the app asks you to record a voice clip, which it uses during recording to prioritize the user’s voice and minimize everything else. The company said it is experimenting with using directional microphones to help with this.
Taya said Wednesday that it has raised $5 million in a seed funding round led by MaC Venture Capital and Female Founders Fund, with participation from a16z Speedrun.
Wagenmans founded the startup in 2024 with Cinnamon Sipper and Amy Zhou, who also previously worked at Apple. Sipper and Zhou have since left the company.
Wagenmans said she wanted to create a lookable wearable that works just for the user because people often don’t use these devices because of concerns about social image and privacy. The company’s ethos is similar to competitors like Sandbar and Pebble, which aim to make personal note-taking devices.
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“We realized there’s a lot of utility you can provide, being a single player [gadget]. Essentially, we want to capture your voice, not the room you’re in or the other people,” he told TechCrunch.
Wagenmans said the startup is experimenting with different mechanisms to make it easier for users to take notes and also receive feedback from the locket that their note has been saved.
The company currently has five full-time employees, along with a few contractors, who work in person from its San Francisco office.
Adrian Fenty, managing partner at MaC Venture Capital, said Taya’s positioning as a non-gadget-like device will help if it gets past early adopters.
“We’re excited about the category, but we’d actually place Taya outside the notebook bin. These products are environment recorders. They record meetings and conversations around you. Single-player intentional capture is focused only on you. We think Taya can be a company that helps human work and personal development and helps people understand their behavior more fun.”
The story has been updated to reflect that the $89 price is the device’s pre-order price.
