Dead AI voice products.
$34M of capital across this category
Voice assistants and synthesis. The category Apple, Amazon, Google, and Microsoft all owned and could not quite figure out what to do with. Cortana retired for Copilot. Tay killed in sixteen hours. Sonantic absorbed into Spotify. Lyrebird absorbed into Descript. The dead products in this category are not failures of voice technology. They are products that voice technology could not save.
Microsoft Cortana
2014 - 2023Microsoft's voice assistant for Windows, phones, and smart speakers, retired in favor of Copilot.
Undisclosed raised · 9 years aliveMycroft AI
2015 - 2023An open-source voice assistant and Linux-based smart speaker positioned as a privacy-respecting alternative to Alexa and Google Assistant.
$6M raised · 8 years aliveSonantic
2018 - 2022A London voice-AI startup that synthesized emotional, human-sounding speech for games and film.
$7M raised · 4 years aliveSnips
2013 - 2019A privacy-first voice assistant platform that ran entirely on-device, pitched to hardware makers as an alternative to Alexa and Google Assistant.
$21M raised · 7 years aliveLyrebird
2017 - 2019A Montreal voice-cloning startup that recreated a speaker's voice from a one-minute sample.
Undisclosed raised · 2 years alive