Daniel Edrisian, a former engineer on OpenAI's Codex team, has left to start a hardware company called Blackstar Computers. The startup, which he describes as a "new kind of computer that knows its user," just landed a $12 million seed round.
The round was led by Abstract, with participation from SV Angel, Naval Ravikant, Chapter One, and Timeless.
Edrisian's thesis is that the next big leap in how humans and AI communicate isn't about better apps—it's about a better operating system. "The software problem is largely solved," he says. "Building applications is easy now. The next step in improving how people and AI talk to each other requires changing the OS."
Blackstar's website frames the mission more broadly: "We're rebuilding computing from the ground up: hardware, software, and the interaction between them."
The team currently has eight people working in-person across San Francisco and Shenzhen. They're hiring across electrical engineering, embedded systems, mechanical engineering, software, machine learning, and industrial design.
Edrisian previously founded Alex, an AI-powered programming tool for Apple's Xcode development environment. His team was acquired by OpenAI in 2025, after which he joined the Codex division. His departure comes as OpenAI continues to push Codex into the enterprise, recently enlisting consulting giants like Accenture and PwC to sell the coding tool to businesses.