Ollie has raised $7.5 million in seed funding as it develops a family-focused AI assistant that helps users manage schedules, meals, shopping, appointments, bills, and other everyday tasks through text messages. The San Diego-based startup says privacy is central to its product, with a subscription business model and policies that prohibit selling user data or using it to train AI models.
The round was led largely by Khosla Ventures, with participation from AI House. Ollie co-founder and CEO Bill Lennon said the company wants users to see the assistant as working directly for them rather than relying on personal data for advertising or model training.
Ollie Connects to Calendars, Email and Family Tasks
Ollie works through text messaging on iOS and Android rather than requiring users to download a separate app. It can connect to calendars and email, coordinate family schedules, create reminders, plan meals, track to-dos, assist with grocery shopping, and help users manage appointments and payments.
The assistant can also participate in group chats with family members, allowing households to share schedules, lists, reminders, and other information. Ollie says it stores conversation history and connected-service data to provide personalized responses, while limiting that information to the user’s account and authorized family members.
The company says it does not share or sell user data and does not use customer information to train large language models. Ollie relies on commercial AI APIs from providers including Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI.
Privacy Becomes a Key Part of Ollie’s Positioning
Ollie says it has implemented safeguards including encryption, access controls, monitoring, security testing, and vendor reviews. Its published privacy policy also says the company collects information such as phone numbers, messages, shared media, preferences, usage data, and diagnostic information needed to operate the service.
For tasks that require logging into a website or making a payment, Ollie does not ask users to hand over usernames or passwords directly. Instead, it opens a cloud browser session and sends the user a link so they can complete the login or payment themselves.
Lennon said the company may eventually use secure tokenization to reduce how often users need to authenticate manually. He said that would require balancing convenience with the level of control users expect when an AI assistant gains access to increasingly sensitive information.
Ollie is competing with consumer assistants including Poke, Fambot, Ohai, Folk, Saner.ai, and Tomo, as well as work-focused products such as Lindy and Reclaim.ai. Lennon declined to disclose Ollie’s current user or paid subscriber count, but said retention among paying customers is comparable with leading AI subscription products.
Featured image credits: ollie.ai
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