Relay的‘AI版Zapier’赌注落幕：融资810万美元，创始人接管谷歌Chrome

做的是什么生意

Relay was a San Francisco workflow automation platform — a Zapier alternative where users automate repeated tasks across Gmail, Slack, Notion and hundreds of apps, with ChatGPT-powered steps and human-in-the-loop approvals.

启动资金：$8.1M total: a $5M seed led by Khosla Ventures (2022) and $3.1M led by Andreessen Horowitz (2023).

起因

Founded in July 2021 by Jacob Bank, who had sold his scheduling startup Timeful to Google in 2015 and later led product work on Gmail and Google Calendar; he recruited former Google colleagues and launched Relay in beta in 2022 with a $5M seed led by Khosla Ventures.

经过

Relay publicly launched on 2023-10-11 with a further $3.1M from a16z, positioning itself as a complete Zapier alternative with AI Autofill, AI Classify and human-in-the-loop approvals. Its AI-focused relaunch reached #2 Product of the Day on Product Hunt on 2024-06-25, but total disclosed funding stayed near $8.1M while Google began baking agentic AI into Chrome with Gemini-powered browsing tasks — turning the browser itself into an automation layer.

结果

In July 2026 Relay stopped accepting new signups and cancelled subscriptions with prorated refunds; free users lost access on 2026-08-15 and paid users on 2026-09-14. Founder Jacob Bank rejoined Google as VP of Product for Chrome, and part of the team followed — a quiet team takeover rather than a sale.

可借鉴之处

如果你的产品价值是功能集，那么你真正的竞争对手是把这些功能集成到用户已经打开的软件中的那个人 —— Relay证明了这一类别，然后看着浏览器将其吸收。