IrisGo AI assistant backed by Andrew Ng introduced
Industry experts believe the next major phase of AI will be "proactive" systems. Such agents predict and execute user needs before they are even realized. IrisGo, a startup aiming for leadership in this field, secured $2.8 million in funding earlier this year from the Andrew Ng-led AI Fund. The company is building a desktop assistant for PCs that learns daily workflows and automates them without human intervention. This is reported by Techcrunch.com .
The IrisGo project was founded by Jeffrey Lai, a former Apple engineer who participated in creating the Chinese version of the Siri voice assistant. Interestingly, the name Iris is derived from spelling Siri backwards. The core idea of the system is simple: show Iris an action once, and it will remember the process for the future without needing further instructions. For example, it can independently handle tasks ranging from ordering coffee online to complex business operations.
Iris comes with a library of pre-built "skills," including functions like drafting emails, processing invoices, generating reports, and summarizing documents. At the same time, it learns from the user's desktop behavior to add new tasks to its repertoire. The app also features a specialized code assistant for developers, similar to OpenAI Codex or Claude Code by Anthropic.
According to founder Jeffrey Lai, the main goal is to free knowledge workers from tedious and repetitive tasks. IrisGo is designed to process most data locally on the device, ensuring higher privacy compared to apps that rely on cloud technologies. The startup is backed not only by Andrew Ng but also by tech giants like NVIDIA and Google.
