Orbits raises $2M from a16z to build Bit, an AI assistant that runs your household

Orbits has raised nearly $2 million in pre-seed funding to build Bit, an AI assistant aimed at a part of life that has received far less attention from the AI boom: running a household.

The Toronto and San Francisco-based startup announced the round Wednesday, with backing from Andreessen Horowitz’s a16z Speedrun fund, N49P, Garage Capital, and several angel investors, including a team member at Anthropic.

Silicon Valley has spent billions building AI tools to make people more productive from 9 to 5. Orbits sees another opportunity after the workday ends, when calendars, groceries, appointments, contractors, chores, dinner plans, and family logistics take over.

Its answer is Bit, an AI household assistant that goes beyond creating lists or suggesting what users should do next. Orbits wants the software to actually do the work.

Bit can browse websites, log into authorized accounts, make purchases, book dinner reservations, reschedule appointments, and collect quotes from service providers for jobs such as roofing or HVAC repairs. It can coordinate calendars and lists, send family members reminders about chores, and communicate with outside providers such as babysitters.

That puts Orbits into a growing race to move AI agents from answering questions to taking actions on a user’s behalf.

“There’s a booming market of tools to simplify your 9-to-5 and almost nothing for your 5-to-9. A household manager used to be something only wealthy families could afford; Bit is one every family can have,” co-founder and CEO Nomaan Ahmed said.

AI agents are coming home

Ahmed founded Orbits with CTO Erik Tillberg. The pair previously helped grow a consumer platform to more than one million monthly subscribers and nine figures in annual recurring revenue, according to the company. Tillberg previously worked as an AI researcher at the University of Toronto.

The founders are betting that household management could become one of the more natural consumer applications for autonomous AI.

It is a harder problem than building another chatbot. An assistant that books a restaurant or finds a contractor needs access to personal information and online accounts. Once an AI agent starts spending money or changing appointments, mistakes carry consequences beyond an incorrect answer in a chat window.

That makes security and user control central to the proposition. Orbits says it end-to-end encrypts third-party account credentials and never stores them. Authorized actions such as purchases still require users to trust Bit with tasks that have traditionally demanded direct human involvement.

The broader shift is already underway. AI companies are pushing agents beyond text generation into software that can browse websites, use applications, and complete multi-step tasks. Orbits is betting that the home, rather than the office, can become a major proving ground for that technology.

“This capital and the support of world-class investors gives us the momentum to turn a clear, widespread consumer need into a category-defining product,” Tillberg said. “We are building an intelligent, shared layer for the home that evolves daily based on how our users live.”

The new funding will go toward infrastructure, hiring, and bringing Bit beyond its initial group of families. The app is currently available for iOS and Android.

The bigger question is whether consumers are ready to hand household chores to an AI agent. Orbits doesn’t need Bit to replace everything people do at home. Getting back a few hours each week could be enough.

After years of AI companies trying to reinvent the workday, the next fight may be over who gets to run the evening.