Nirva Raises $33 Million for a Voice-Only AI Pendant

Nirva has raised $33 million in total for a pendant that Nirva says processes only the wearer’s speech. The company announced a new $25 million pre-Series A round, adding to $8 million raised earlier this year from investors including Lightspeed and South Park Commons.

What is Nirva building?

TechCrunch reported that Nirva was founded in 2025 by Wei Lyu and Jason Chen, both former Meta Reality Labs employees, and Hanying Hu, who founded a fashion and jewelry brand. TechCrunch identified Lyu as the company’s CEO.

Nirva describes its first device as a pendant that can also be worn as a bracelet. TechCrunch said the roughly eight-gram weight makes it easy to wear all day, while its battery lasts up to three days on one charge. Longer term, Nirva aims to release more devices.

Lyu said the company wants to build a wearable that blends into fashion while also providing value to users. In a call with TechCrunch, Nirva CEO Lyu said:

“This is a piece of jewelry that only focuses on listening to your own speech. We are not like a voice recorder or like a meeting note taker.

One key difference between us, Taya, Vocci, or Sandbar Ring is that we’re always passively listening to your own speech. So it’s always on. It keeps modeling the user and modeling your mind.”

How does the pendant separate the wearer’s voice?

TechCrunch cited privacy as a central issue because ambient devices may record people throughout the day. The report also said Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses have fueled fear among bystanders that wearers may be recording them.

Nirva addresses that concern by asking users to record snippets of their voice during onboarding. The startup builds its model from those samples. During use, Nirva says the device filters out conversations and data captured from other people nearby. That process, the company says, leaves only the wearer being recorded.

By default, Nirva says its system stores neither audio data nor transcripts after processing conversations. Before discarding the audio, the company says it tracks tone, pitch, volume and speed. Nirva derives emotion-related understanding from those signals and presents the results in its app.

What does the app infer?

TechCrunch described Nirva as a personal-insights company rather than a productivity startup. Nirva says its app can still show reminders, action items and suggested ways to act on them. Lyu said that support aims to help users show up for others better in their lives.

Lyu also said:

“I think there’s no universal way to help everyone to solve their problems. We are building a tool to help people to improve their self-understanding, self-compassion, and self-awareness.”

Nirva says its companion app parses speech and infers personality-related patterns, including people frequently around the user, places visited and other daily notes. Lyu said the app surfaces insights into emotions and communication style, plus ways users can improve.

Lyu described an incident in which she forgot to thank her mother for something. The app later nudged her with a reminder about it.

When will orders and deliveries begin?

Nirva will begin taking orders in November and aims to ship devices to early users by the end of the year. The company set the price at $249 and plans to offer silver, brushed silver, black and gold versions.

Who is competing in ambient AI?

TechCrunch cited three recent ambient-AI launches around Nirva:

• TechCrunch reported that Amazon launched a new wrist-worn device with Bee.
• TechCrunch also said a former Plaud executive launched ambient apps through Ambi, which aims to build its own hardware.
• TechCrunch added that Apple launched Voice Intelligence features during its iPhone launch in September.

Taya, founded by former Apple employees, is building intelligent jewelry, according to TechCrunch. Friend and Bee are also trying to build companion gadgets, the report said.

Nirva’s next test is whether the company can begin orders in November and ship by year-end while delivering the wearer-only processing and personal insights it has described. Its $249 device will then compete with intelligent jewelry and companion gadgets from Taya, Friend and Bee.