Artificial Intelligence · Profile from AI Research Companion
Rabbit
The small Santa Monica start-up led by Chinese-born entrepreneur Jesse Lyu that became the surprise hit of CES in January 2024 with the R1, a $199 orange handheld designed with Teenage Engineering that promised a "large action model" (LAM) able to use apps on the owner's behalf, took ~100,000 orders in about three months (company claim; ~130,000 units sold by June 2024, Forbes) — and then became, with Humane's pin, the emblem of over-promised AI hardware. Reviewers found it slow and limited; journalists showed its interface was an Android app; a YouTube investigator tied the company to an abandoned NFT project; and hobbyists found hard-coded API keys in its code (June 2024). Unlike Humane, Rabbit kept going: it shipped LAM Playground and teach mode (late 2024), rabbitOS 2 (September 2025), a cross-platform agent OS called OS3 (September 2026) and announced a ~$500 Linux "Cyberdeck" for AI-assisted coding (March 2026), while reportedly struggling to pay its ~26 staff in late 2025. Rabbit is the case of a cheap device that sold on a viral demo and survived by turning itself into an agent-software company (section 23).
At a glance
- Founded
- Company originally named Cyber Manufacture Co. (Wikipedia gives "Cyber Manufacturing Co"), founded by Jesse Lyu; renamed Rabbit Inc. in late 2023, about two months before the R1 launch (reported)
- Headquarters
- Santa Monica, California (reported)
- Ownership / structure
- Private, venture-backed
- Leadership (2026)
- Jesse Lyu (founder and CEO); Jesper Kouthoofd, co-founder of Teenage Engineering, joined in April 2024 (company; role reported as chief design officer, verify)
- AI products
- R1 handheld (unveiled 9 January 2024; shipped from late April 2024); rabbitOS and the "large action model"; beta rabbit (July 2024); LAM Playground (October 2024); teach mode (November 2024); rabbitOS 2 with user "creations" (September 2025); OS3 cross-platform agent OS with a desktop-control agent (generally available 22 September 2026); Project Cyberdeck Linux handheld PC (announced March 2026, not shipped as of October 2026, verify)
- Scale
- First 10,000 R1s sold on 9 January 2024; ~50,000 by mid-January (reported); ~100,000 orders (company claim, early 2024); ~130,000 units sold (Forbes, 18 June 2024); ~5,000 people using an R1 at any given moment out of ~100,000 owners (Lyu, The Verge, 25 September 2024); 26 employees (company, late 2025, reported)
- Capital raised
- ~$6m (November 2021) for the predecessor's GAMA NFT project (reported); $20m from Khosla Ventures, Synergis Capital and Kakao Investment (October 2023); $10m more led by Khosla (December 2023), ~$30m in total (company); later reports cite ~$46m in total, presumably including later money (unconfirmed; use ~$30m for pre-launch capital); a further round said to be closing "in the coming weeks" in late 2025 (company, reported; closing not confirmed)
- Key partnerships
- Teenage Engineering (industrial design); Perplexity (answers; one year of Perplexity Pro for the first 100,000 buyers, January 2024); model and service suppliers including ElevenLabs (voice), Microsoft Azure, Yelp and Google Maps (revealed by the June 2024 key leak) and OpenAI models (reported)
- Signature moves (incl. failures)
- From Cyber Manufacture to Rabbit and the Khosla round (2023); the CES R1 launch and pre-orders (2024); the Perplexity bundle (2024); shipping, reviews and the Android-app reveal (2024); the Coffeezilla allegations and API-key exposure (2024); LAM Playground and teach mode (2024); rabbitOS 2 and the cash crunch (2025); Cyberdeck and OS3 (2026)
8 strategic moves analysed
Each one gets a full strategy file in the companion: context, the decision, the financing, what happened, and the lesson.
2023
From Cyber Manufacture to Rabbit and the Khosla Round
Founding / pivot / funding round
2024
CES R1 Launch and Preorders
Launch
2024
Coffeezilla LAM Allegations and API Key Exposure
Controversy / security incident
2024
LAM Playground and Teach Mode
Launch (software)
2024
Perplexity Bundle
Partnership
2024
Shipping Reviews and the Android App Reveal
Launch / failure
2025
rabbitOS 2 and the Cash Crunch
Launch (software) / restructuring
2026
Cyberdeck and OS3
Pivot / launch