Raven, a Y Combinator F26 startup, has opened pre-orders for an "agentic phone" that runs AI agents on a user's behalf, collecting a $199 refundable deposit even though it has announced no shipping date. The company, legally Sintem, Inc., is by YC's directory count a team of one.
The timing is notable. Samsung has called its Galaxy S26 an "agentic AI phone," and China's StepFun has already shipped a device. Raven is wagering that a small startup can reach the same destination by a different route.
What Raven is selling
The homepage puts it plainly: "Raven. The AI phone that does your busywork. Ask once. Get on with your day." Four named agents carry the load: Liam handles preparation, Kai writing, Mo details and Dex building.
Raven also pitches a "command center for your agents" meant to work alongside tools such as Codex or Claude. The site displays icons for Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, Slack, Microsoft/Teams, Notion, Salesforce, Asana and GitHub. No partnership announcements back them up, so readers should not take the icons as confirmed integrations.
Among the other features described, a daily schedule gathers "plans, promises and commitments" into a single view, and the phone is meant to produce notes, summaries and follow-ups from calls and live conversations. A "create your own apps" function comes with a sample prompt: "Make me a Japanese tutor app."
Pricing and terms
The checkout page lists a $199 reservation deposit and says "every dollar goes toward your first subscription payments." Raven's terms promise a full refund any time before shipment.
The company expects a monthly plan of $99 to $199, which it said is meant to bundle the phone, the AI features and cellular service. The pre-order terms, updated October 30, say pricing and inclusions are not final.
On timing, the terms are blunt: "Raven is not ready to ship, and we have not announced a shipping date." The company may also invite selected people to try early software on phones they already own.
The founder and the backing
Isa Usmanov is the listed founder. YC's directory places the company in the F26 batch, founded in 2026 and based in Germany, with a team size of one. That count may be out of date.
According to an OpenAI Developers LinkedIn post from June 2026, Usmanov's "Agentic OS for a Phone" won the People's Choice award at OpenAI's Voice Hack Night. Raven's own timeline page says the project made its public debut at OpenAI's San Francisco headquarters.
Dealroom, a third-party database, lists a $125,000 seed investment from Y Combinator dated September 2026. Raven has not confirmed the figure, and Dealroom notes that not every field in its records is verified.
Usmanov has been fairly direct about his ambitions. "I am building a device around a single KPI: how little time can you spend on it while still getting everything done?" he wrote on LinkedIn. In an October 8 post on X, he said the software "runs on the OS level, so it works on any call: WhatsApp, phone, Google Meet, any."
What is still missing
Raven publishes no hardware specifications, from chipset and memory to storage, camera and battery. It has not named carrier partners for the cellular service. The terms say regulatory certifications and shipping destinations will be confirmed before activation.
There is also a small puzzle in the timeline. The company's page says the first test devices reached its earliest adopters in October 2026, yet the pre-order terms say it is not ready to ship. No independent hands-on reviews have surfaced, so there is nothing outside Raven's own materials to measure the claims against.
A crowded field
Samsung's TM Roh put the category's promise this way, as reported February 25: "A phone that takes actions on your behalf. This is the agentic AI phone." Honor, by reported plan, intends to sell its "Robot Phone" in the second half of 2026.
StepFun's StepX Neo is priced at 3,999 yuan, according to a Techtimes review dated October 15 and a Zentor research note. Techtimes called it the first shipped agent phone.
Other YC companies are working nearby. Cyclon (F26) describes "a phone where AI is the interface," while Phone Harness (F26) lets AI agents control iOS and Android devices. Raven is unrelated to Raven Prism, an AR product Avegant launched on October 29.
Hardware history argues for caution. Digital Trends called the Rabbit R1 "one of the worst gadgets I've ever reviewed" in 2024, and 9to5Google reported in September 2024 that only 5,000 people used it daily.
Raven's homepage offers its own thesis: "Your phone shouldn't be exciting. Your life should."
